What is a system?

Michael Kuras
MITRE

Joseph DeRosa

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     Last modified: March 29, 2006

Abstract
The notion of a system, although central to system engineering, is very poorly defined. In order to recognize, understand and reach beyond the limits of traditional system engineering, an improved definition of a system is required. Such a definition has to be able to capture the multi scale aspact of many systems; it has to capture both the structural and dynamic aspects of most systems; and it has to account for the unavoidable entanglement of subjectivity and objectivity in the human perception of systems. Such a definition underpins the analytic aspects of complex-system engineering and is discussed.