„A linguistic system is a series of differences of sound combined with a series of differences of ideas; but the pairing of a certain number of acoustical signs with as many cuts made from the mass of thought engenders a system of values.“

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— Ferdinand de Saussure, buch Cours de linguistique générale

Quelle: Cours de linguistique générale (1916), p. 120

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Ferdinand de Saussure1

Sprachwissenschaftler 1857 - 1913

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— Harold Chestnut American engineer 1917 - 2001

Quelle: Systems Engineering Tools, (1965), Systems Engineering Methods (1967), p. 1: First paragraph of Ch. 1. The Environment for System Engineering Methods

„Because truths of different kinds exhibit the characteristics of incommensurability (their difference is such that they cannot be measured by a single standard or reduced to members of one series) and incompossibility (their difference is such that they cannot co-exist within the same system), such openness introduces both multiplicity and contradiction, and the creature in question stands “divided against himself.”“

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— David L. Norton American philosopher 1930 - 1995

Quelle: Personal Destinies: A Philosophy of Ethical Individualism (1976), pp. 9-10

„Systems science is generally said to have emerged during and after World War II, although there were precursors to the basic ideas. The people who created each school of thought were working largely independently, although many of them knew each other. They came from different disciplines, they were working on different problems, they formulated different variations of the principles of systems and cybernetics, and they often chose to affiliate with different academic societies.“

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— Stuart A. Umpleby American scientist 1944

Quelle: "The origins and purposes of several traditions in systems theory and cybernetics," 1999, p. 79: Introduction

„General systems theory is a series of related definitions, assumptions, and postulates about all levels of systems from atomic particles through atoms, molecules, crystals, viruses, cells, organs, individuals, small groups, societies, planets, solar systems, and galaxies. General behavior systems theory is a subcategory of such theory, dealing with living systems, extending roughly from viruses through societies. A significant fact about living things is that they are open systems, with important inputs and outputs. Laws which apply to them differ from those applying to relatively closed systems.“

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— James Grier Miller biologist 1916 - 2002

Miller (1956) "General behavior systems theory and summary". In: Journal of Counseling Psychology. 3 (2) 120-124. Cited in: Francis Ferguson (1975) Architecture, cities and the systems approach. p. 12

„There are tremendous actual differences in values. Some value systems, such as the ones that motivate "honor killings", deserve to be morally condemned and rejected. But there are many other variations in values within the bounds of decency.“

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— Richard Stallman American software freedom activist, short story writer and computer programmer, founder of the GNU project 1953

"The Zeitgeist Movement" (2009) https://stallman.org/articles/zeitgeist.html
2000s

„When… we have a series of values of a quantity which continually diminish, and in such a way, that name any quantity we may, however small, all the values, after a certain value, are severally less than that quantity, then the symbol by which the values are denoted is said to diminish without limit. And if the series of values increase in succession, so that name any quantity we may, however great, all after a certain point will be greater, then the series is said to increase without limit.“

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— Augustus De Morgan British mathematician, philosopher and university teacher (1806-1871) 1806 - 1871

It is also frequently said, when a quantity diminishes without limit, that it has nothing, zero or 0, for its limit: and that when it increases without limit it has infinity or ∞ or 1&frasl;0 for its limit.
The Differential and Integral Calculus (1836)

„It's true feathers and scales are both made of keratin, same building block, that's true. But that's where the similarity stops, okay? Actually, birds and reptiles have different lung systems. And they have different reproductive systems, different body coverings, different brains, and different circulatory systems. Thousands of differences exist between dinosaurs and birds. That could be a whole seminar by itself.“

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— Kent Hovind American young Earth creationist 1953

Creation seminars (2003-2005), Lies in the textbooks

„Applying this approach, systems belonging to different scientific disciplines are investigated in their natural forms. On the basis of experimental results, isomorphic relations between different systems are studied and, finally, some general principles applicable for all systems of a certain class are formulated.“

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— George Klir American computer scientist 1932 - 2016

Quelle: An approach to general systems theory (1969), p. 97 as cited in: B. Van Rootselaar (2009) Annals of Systems Research. p. 114: About the aim of general systems theory

„In the development of the great series of animal organisms, the Nervous System assumes more and more of an imperial character.“

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— George Henry Lewes British philosopher 1817 - 1878

The Principles of Success in Literature (1865)
Kontext: In the development of the great series of animal organisms, the Nervous System assumes more and more of an imperial character. The rank held by any animal is determined by this character, and not at all by its bulk, its strength, or even its utility. In like manner, in the development of the social organism, as the life of nations becomes more complex, Thought assumes a more imperial character; and Literature, in its widest sense, becomes a delicate index of social evolution. Barbarous societies show only the germs of literary life. But advancing civilisation, bringing with it increased conquest over material agencies, disengages the mind from the pressure of immediate wants, and the loosened energy finds in leisure both the demand and the means of a new activity: the demand, because long unoccupied hours have to be rescued from the weariness of inaction; the means, because this call upon the energies nourishes a greater ambition and furnishes a wider arena.

„The grammatical system has … a functional input and a structural output; it provides the mechanism for different functions to be combined in one utterance“

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— Michael Halliday Australian linguist 1925 - 2018

Quelle: 1970s and later, Explorations in the functions of language, 1973, p. 35 cited in: Terence Odlin (1994) Perspectives on Pedagogical Grammar. p. 193.

„The way in which the universe expands is determined by the variation of this [radius of curvature] R with the time. There are three types, or families, of non-static universes… the oscillating universes, and the expanding universes of the first and of the second kind. …each of these is a representative of a family, comprising an infinite number of members differing in size and shape. …In the expanding family of the first kind the radius is continually increasing from… zero… In the expanding series of the second type the radius has at the initial time a certain minimum value, different for the different members of the family. [Both kinds of expanding families] become infinite after an infinite time.“

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— Willem de Sitter Dutch cosmologist 1872 - 1934

Kosmos (1932)

„Saussure took the sign as the organizing concept for linguistic structure, using it to express the conventional nature of language in the phrase "l'arbitraire du signe". This has the effect of highlighting what is, in fact, the one point of arbitrariness in the system, namely the phonological shape of words, and hence allows the non-arbitrariness of the rest to emerge with greater clarity. An example of something that is distinctly non-arbitrary is the way different kinds of meaning in language are expressed by different kinds of grammatical structure, as appears when linguistic structure is interpreted in functional terms.“

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— Michael Halliday Australian linguist 1925 - 2018

Michael Halliday (1977). "Ideas about Language" Reprinted in Volume 3 of MAK Halliday's Collected Works. Edited by J.J. Webster. London: Continuum. p113.
1970s and later