368 BOOKREVIEWS
due to the stress on empiricism or for-
malism characteristically associated with
the model. Hence, when decisions are
executed in the game theory models, it is
assumed that the players are rational and
that their personal feelings are not an
issue.
This purely structural analysis is not
adequate. Lefebvre is concerned with the
values associated with the various deci-
sions. The participants may differ in what
they consider to be salient or normative
values. The former will have a major
influence on the decision making process.
This concern for conflicts over value
and the content of awareness or con-
sciousness forms an intrinsic part of the
sociology of knowledge. By studying the
structure of consciousness, Lefebvre is
concerned with similar issues. He may
argue that he is basically a mathemati-
cian who is trying to develop a formal
system and is not concerned with those
situations which are less than ideal. In
this sense, his work is comparable to that
of Noam Chomsky with his concern for a
mathematical theory of human language
divorced from the constraints imposed by
a real-time model of human performance.
This argument, however, does not hold.
The mathematical structures developed
by these theorists do have constraints
built into them and these constraints
reflect both biological and social pro-
cesses. Hence, the difference that Le-
febvre is concerned with is one of degree
and not of kind.
In the foreword to this book, Rapoport
criticizes the formal language devised by
Lefebvre. There is a disparity between
the symbolism of the reflexive polyno-
mials and observations introduced by the
author. This criticism can be remedied, in
part, by incorporating some of the recent
work in ethnomethodology and discourse
analysis. The former is of particular
interest because it attempts to charac-
terize the process of drawing inferences
based on background assumptions and
tacit knowledge. Nevertheless, the work
of Lefebvre on the structure of awareness
does represent a definite contribution to
mathematical sociolinguistics and should
Behavioral Science, Volume 22, 1977
form the basic text upon which other
research paradigms will emerge.
ROBERT N. ST. CLAIR
University of Louisville
Ludwig von Bertalanffy: Perspectives on
General Systems Theory -Scien-
tific and Philosophical Studies.
New York: Braziller, 1975, 283
pp., paperback, $3.95.
This is an exceptional book. It is not
only the educated layman, to whom these
essays are addressed, who will appreciate
this easy-to-read mine of philosophical
thought. These essays demonstrate Lud-
wig von Bertalanffy’s stature as the
scientist who, donning the philosopher’s
mantle, develops new and refreshing
insights into the why and wherefore of
the world around us. Even those readers
familiar with Bertalanffy’s work will find
a treasure trove. Most of the chapters
.derive from papers originally published
in German language periodicals between
1926 and 1950.
We are indebted to his widow, Maria
von Bertalanffy, for collecting and order-
ing these papers which, as she puts it,
reflect her husband’s years of struggle for
unity; to Ervin Laszlo, the author’s friend
over many years, who worked with her
to complete the task, and to Edgar
Taschdjian, Bertalanffy’s fellow biologist
and Austrian, who finally edited the
literary legacy of one who, in Laszlo’s
words, was “not only a scientist but also
a Reneaissance man,” the creator of
this “intellectual voyage of breathtaking
scope.”
Notes on selected ports of call along
the route are all that can be given here.
In particular, the scientific specialist
with little time for philosophical dis-
course should set aside the few hours
needed to read this slim volume. It is
possible that he will find in this brief
story of a fellow scientist’s struggle for
recognition of his ideas a personal chal-
lenge in respect of his own work.
The chef d‘oeuvre “Perspectives in Art
and Science” (19461, focuses on the central
theme from which this book takes its
 BOOKREVIEWS
title. It analyzes the origins and reasoning
behind the cavalier perspective charac-
teristic of Japanese prints, the Egyptian
convention, whose perspectives of im-
portance adjusts the size of an image to
that person’s political status, and the
space representation which entered West-
ern art with the theory put forward by
Leon Battista Alberti in 1435.
Biological considerations lead the au-
thor to Uexkull’s tenet that any organiza-
tion necessarily sees its world as a picture
created by its own sensory and perceptive
capabilities with all that this implies seen
in the light of symbols and what they
may stand for in different countries.
Chapter 2 reproduces Bertalanffy’s
basic organismic concept, “New Patterns
of Biological and Medical Thought” (1960)
previously published as a Festschrift by
a medical congress at Regensburg in the
late 1950s. It presents the clearest and
most concise statement of general sys-
tems theory that this reviewer knows,
and how, in Bertalanffy’s view, cyber-
netics relates to it.
The scientific stage set, the author
reaches back into history for philosophi-
cal antecedents of his own systems think-
ing by examining the structures con-
ceived by three German philosophers:
Cusa, or Cusenius, a 15th century intel-
lectual phenomenon, and two 19th cen-
tury men - Vaihinger, who created the
“as if’ concept, and Spengler, whose
Decline and Fall o f the West created a
sensation at the time. Of course, relevant
work of many others is cited. Goethe’s
ideas on morphology, Leibnitz’s disserta-
tions on science, and the writings of
Chatelier, among others, are noted and
surveyed.
As Laszlo puts it, Bertalanffy felt a close
affinity with Cusenius and regarded him
“as a precursor of systems thinking.” Like
Bertalanffy, a pioneer ahead of his time,
Cusenius had broken with Aristotelian
ideas early, recognizing long before Coper-
nicus, Kepler and Galileo, the infinity of
the universe. Fighting for freedom of
thought on all fronts, Cusenius, a church-
man himself, advocated reconciliation be-
tween the church and dissenters on their
Behavioral Science, Volume 22, 1977
369
terms over issues espoused later by Luther
and Calvin.
The story of Cusa’s one man crusade,
journeying through most European coun-
tries in the defence of the true faith makes
thought-provoking reading. One can see
the parallel between Cusa’s life and
Bertalanffy’s crusade for unification and
the acceptance of a general systems theory.
Considering that knowledge necessarily
must be uncertain, since knowledge con-
sists of comparing the known with the un-
known, speculation about God inescapably
led Cusa’s thinking toward mysticism.
Mysticism in human thought is taken a
good deal further within the framework of
Vaihinger’s als ob (as if) concept. Vai-
hinger, who had completed his monu-
mental work in 1870 but kept it in his desk
for 35 years, took myth to be the primaeval
form of his own als ob. This view, recog-
nizes that concepts such as freedom, god,
immortality or human dignity are actually
figments but carry such practical im-
portance that one must act “as if’ they
were reality.
Contrasting this kind of conceptual
background with modern physics, Berta-
lanffy affirms his own point of view by
concluding the chapter with a quotation
from Vaihinger:
The new century will have to fight for
new myth, a fight t o which it is led by
the recent renewal of metaphysics on
the one hand, and on the other, by the
increasing clarity with which exact
science must reject all metaphysics.
Whether the 20th century will renew
the old myths of religion or will create
a new myth-in any case, it cannot re-
main without a myth.
Bertalanffy’s critique of Spengler’s work
reviews culture, structure, style and ap-
plication of system models before discuss-
ing the singularity of the concepts of
globality and technology. Taken together,
they are shown “to explode the cycle
scheme and place our civilisation on a
different level from previous ones.” The
problems encountered in raising the living
standards of the Third World closer to our
370 BOOK REVIEWS
own seem t o endorse the author’s con-
clusions.
Chapters 6 through 12 reflect Berta-
lanffy’s growing conviction of the inter-
disciplinary powers that the general sys-
tems concepts offer. The journey takes us
from a low-key discourse on “Homology as
a Concept” (1934) to the fully matured
summary of Bertalanffy’s integrative con-
ceptual framework encompassing both
science and philosophy across the world
of human knowledge as he set it down in
“History and Development of General
Systems Theory” (1971).
The chapters in between consider the
points raised by the enormous number of
elements and processes characteristic of
organic systems and follow laws that can
already, at least partly, be expressed today
in mathematical formulae. The key ques-
tion is are these organizational laws the
same as or different from physical laws?
Consideration of order governs the dis-
course. How order comes about, asserts
itself and leads on to equifinality, which
allows a system to reach the same goal
from different starting points, an exclusive
property of organisms, is the final criterion.
Mechanisms acting as entities on their
own can only reach a predetermined goal,
e.g., each piece of a coral polyp when cut
up can develop into a normal polyp.
The later chapters “Theoretical Models
in Biology” (1965) and a “Biological World
View” (1967) offer chapter and verse for
ideas sketched in “The Organismic Con-
ception” 25 years earlier. The ideas pro-
gress from “robots and mechanical figu-
rines. . .imitating human movements,”
accepted for 150 years “as the technical
personification of a theory of the living
organism as a mechanical artifact,” to the
question as to what our knowledge of life
may expect from biology.
The answer to that question establishes
general systems theory as:
A general theory of wholeness, of entire
systems in which many variations in-
teract and in which the organization
produces a strong interaction . . . no
longer do we see in the world a blind
play of atoms but rather a great orga-
nization. It is a world view which was
Behavioral Science, Volume 22, 1977
advocated by Leibnitz and Goethe but
which we begin to take seriously only
now.
Modesty bids Bertalanffy to stress the
embryonic character of general systems
theory at the time of writing (1967), while
his undaunted pioneering spirit takes
heart from recalling that “it took more
than 200 years before the intuitive world
system of Copernicus and Kepler was
transformed into the physics of high school
textbooks.”
“Open Systems in Physics and Biology”
provides further evidence in support of a
general systems theory. Contrasting
Heraclitus’ claim that everything is in flux
with the static notions in eleatic philoso-
phical teaching, Bertalanffy surveys the
scene as it evolved from the scientific work
of the physiologists Claud Bernard and
Dubois-Raymond, who first spoke of dyna-
mic equilibrium in organisms. The in-
tellectual journey continues through
Thomson on neuroelectricity, Helmholtz
on diffusion potential, to Eastman and
Wagner’s theory of thermal diffusions and
Maxwell’s demon, Auerbach’s doctrine of
Ectropy and, thermodynamics, entropy
and a lot more about biological processes.
Not least of these are Watson and Crick’s
DNA models, an exposition which admits
of no doubt as to the nature of open sys-
tems and their unique properties.
“Evolution: Chance or Law” (1969) con-
siders the ultimate “reduction of the
phenomenon of life to the molecular prop-
erties of DNA promised in popular ac-
counts,” as something less than convincing
“because the conventional categories, con-
cepts and models in physics and chemistry
do not deal with organismic characteris-
tics.” Psychological equilibrium, or rather
its manifest lack in many people today,
the social sciences trying out Brave New
World or 1984 ideas, pass in review. Dar-
win’s work is critically examined before
the author codifies his own view by out-
lining seven problems unsolved by conven-
tional theory which deserve empirical re-
search and conceptual evaluation to
achieve a “revision of the so-called mech-
anistic approach to science as a whole.”
Starting with “A Historical Prelude,”
 BOOKREVIEWS
the concluding chapter summarizes the
foundations of general systems theory,
trends in general systems theory, systems
science, mathematical systems theory,
systems technology, and systems philoso-
phy in about 8000 words.
A unique index testifies to the rare
quality of this slim book and the over-
whelming wealth of ideas it presents.
There are more than 1200 entries for just
under 135 pages of text.
Bertalanffy's work continues to be sub-
Behavioral Science, Volume 22, 1977
371
jected to attack. However, general systems
theorists should welcome attacks as an
aid to putting their house in order. Con-
tentions that general systems theory
amounts to no more than a restatement
of general dynamic theory surely over-
looks Ludwig von Bertalanfffs philosophic
achievements. However that may be, let
the dialogue rest on properly supported
argument.
F. DE P. HANIKA
GAMS, Vienna