On "system"

conceptual anti-reflexivity (strand 1)

pp. 57-68

in: Robert L. Flood, Liberating systems theory, Berlin, Springer, 1990

Abstract

A unique feature of holism is the possibility of and tendency toward describing everything in systems terms. This can be explained by its early development within the forced confines of a nonreflective positivistically oriented General Systems Theory. We can choose to consider any situation as a system and know that, of course, it is also a sub- and supra-system...."Is it not?" That is unless the Universe is the system in focus, which is naturally heralded as the ultimate supra-system. Apparently there is no need to look beyond the horizon of this closed set of concepts...."Can this be so?"