#ISSS2019 Corvallis

During the past few years significant progress has been made towards realizing a scientific general theory of systems that could unify the systems sciences and provide a distinct theoretical foundation of systems engineering. In this presentation, I will review the main elements of these advances and connections between them and related work, and report on efforts to accelerate these developments, integrate them, and leverage the outcomes.

In the period since the founding of the ISSS much progress was made in the specialized systems sciences (e.g. complexity theory, fractal theory, game theory, hierarchy theory, automata theory, network theory etc.) but the search for a general theory has mostly produced heuristic principles for what is today called “systems thinking”. However, in recent years four significant initiatives have brought specific focus to the challenge of advancing a scientific GST. These keystone projects are:

The INCOSE “Fellows’ Initiative on SE and System Definitions” project
The INCOSE “Principles Action Team” project
The ISSS-inspired “General Theory of Design Elegance” project
The INCOSE-inspired “Foundations for Systems Engineering” (F4SE) Project
In this paper I will outline these projects and the advances they delivered or inspired so far, and discuss their plans and promise for future progress.