A system is a group of interacting or interrelated elements that act according to a set of rules to form a unified whole.
[1] A system, surrounded and influenced by its environment, is described by its boundaries, structure and purpose and is expressed in its functioning.
[2][3] In the 19th century, the French physicist Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot, who studied thermodynamics, pioneered the development of the concept of a system in the natural sciences.
In 1850, the German physicist Rudolf Clausius generalized this picture to include the concept of the surroundings and began to use the term working body when referring to the system.
In 1945 he introduced models, principles, and laws that apply to generalized systems or their subclasses, irrespective of their particular kind, the nature of their component elements, and the relation or 'forces' between them.
[4] In the late 1940s and mid-50s, Norbert Wiener and Ross Ashby pioneered the use of mathematics to study systems of control and communication, calling it cybernetics.
[7][8] In the 1980s, John Henry Holland, Murray Gell-Mann and others coined the term complex adaptive system at the interdisciplinary Santa Fe Institute.
One can make simplified representations (models) of the system in order to understand it and to predict or impact its future behavior.
The main elements they have in common are the components that handle input, scheduling, spooling and output; they also have the ability to interact with local and remote operators.
[9] The data tests are performed to verify the correctness of the individual subsystem configuration data (e.g. MA Length, Static Speed Profile, …) and they are related to a single subsystem in order to test its Specific Application (SA).
[12] Walter F. Buckley defined systems in sociology in terms of mechanical, organic, and process models.
Artificial systems inherently have a major defect: they must be premised on one or more fundamental assumptions upon which additional knowledge is built.
An economic system is a social institution which deals with the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services in a particular society.
This systems mode of international analysis has however been challenged by other schools of international relations thought, most notably the constructivist school, which argues that an over-large focus on systems and structures can obscure the role of individual agency in social interactions.
They include human brain functions and mental processes as well as normative ethics systems and social and cultural behavioral patterns.
Numerous psychologists, including Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud developed systems that logically organize psychological domains, such as personalities, motivations, or intellect and desire.
Each ring—leadership, processes, infrastructure, population and action units—could be used to isolate key elements of any system that needed change.