Top 7 Quotes & Sayings by Ludwig von Bertalanffy

Explore popular quotes and sayings by Ludwig von Bertalanffy.

Last updated on September 17, 2024.

Karl Ludwig von Bertalanffy was an Austrian biologist known as one of the founders of general systems theory (GST). This is an interdisciplinary practice that describes systems with interacting components, applicable to biology, cybernetics and other fields. Bertalanffy proposed that the classical laws of thermodynamics might be applied to closed systems, but not necessarily to "open systems" such as living things. His mathematical model of an organism's growth over time, published in 1934, is still in use today.

September 19, 1901 - June 12, 1972

Source: Wikipedia

I think that the fact that a theory so vague, so insufficiently verifiable, and so far from the criteria otherwise applied in "hard" science, could become a dogma, can be explained only on sociological grounds.

Ludwig von Bertalanffy

We are seeking another basic outlook: the world as an organization. This would profoundly change categories of our thinking and influence our practical attitudes. We must envision the biosphere as a whole with mutually reinforcing or mutually destructive inter-dependencies.

Ludwig von Bertalanffy

People are not machines, but in all situations where they are given the opportunity, they will act like machines.

Ludwig von Bertalanffy

Considering the inconceivable complexity of processes even in a simple cell, it is little short of a miracle that the simplest possible model - namely, a linear equation between two variables - actually applies in quite a general number of cases.

Ludwig von Bertalanffy

It is the 'zoomorphic' or 'rattomorphic' fallacy - the expressed or implicit contention that there is no essential difference between rat and man - which makes American psychology so profoundly disturbing.

Ludwig von Bertalanffy

Progress is only possible by passing from a state of undifferentiated wholeness to differentiation of parts.

Ludwig von Bertalanffy

Thus even supposedly unadulterated facts of observation already are interfused with all sorts of conceptual pictures, model concepts, theories or whatever expression you choose. The choice is not whether to remain in the field of data or to theorize; the choice is only between models that are more or less abstract, generalized, near or more remote from direct observation, more or less suitable to represent observed phenomena.

Ludwig von Bertalanffy

Top 7 Quotes & Sayings by Ludwig von Bertalanffy

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