General Systems Theory: Its Past and Potential

This paper has three parts. First, I discuss what I take as the original stimulus and the purpose of general systems theory (GST) to be, why I think it is important, and how I came to be involved in it. I reflect on von Bertalanffy's general system (sic) theory and the early debates on the topic, stressing the essential concept of isomorphism, with its rewards in following up parallel developments in different domains, and its risks and temptations in the projection of grand and all‐inclusive systems. Second, I discuss the direction my own work took after my term as President of the Society for General Systems Research (1966–1967), and how it diverged from the early program, in particular in its emphasis on the difference between system and structure and on the essential role of individual subjectivity in the latter. I stress the importance of the concept of ‘relation’ as underlying that of ‘system’, and in particular the difference between relations as embodied in physical systems and relations as components of intentional structures that may or may not correspond to physical systems. In the third and final part, I discuss the place of GST in the philosophy of science, especially in connection with the unity of science movement, and its potential for the organization of this domain. I ask what light the concept of system can throw on our knowledge of the universe and its worlds (a distinction explained in the paper), and what the risks are of assuming tight isomorphisms between mathematical structures and physical systems, for example, in cosmology and quantum mechanics.