5.4.3 the Foundation of Systems Engineering

Abstract

Systems Engineering is an existing reality but what is it? Many definitions exist but there seems to be no universally accepted one. Is it a process, a department, or an engineering discipline? From whence did it come and upon what fundamental scientific, mathematical, or logical facts does its foundation rest? The author team intends, over a period of time, to research earlier related work reported upon in National Council on Systems Engineering (NCOSE) publications and other literature, explore these questions in new research, and periodically report progress to NCOSE membership through Symposium papers and presentations and NCOSE Journal papers. This paper begins this process reporting on an intended course of action, identifying the people involved, soliciting the interest of others in pursuing these questions, and offering preliminary results. The initial work reported upon entails identification of a team, its mission, and several theories that will be pursued in research efforts by subteams seeking to support those theories or prove them false. The careful reader will see in this process a merger of the systems approach and the scientific method as a basis for the research project. The several theories are alternative scenarios that will be explored. The final result may be to show that some combination of the theories offers the complete answer supporting the notion that we are inflicted with competing alternative theories at present because we are all looking at specific manifestations of a more general concept than we are presently able to observe and describe. We should be seeking a simpler and more elegant structure that embraces all of our views. We say that we will apply the scientific method but also recognize that this venerated method may be part of the problem inhibiting people from recognizing the critical role that people play in the systems approach. While the team enters this study with the predisposition that systems theory and qualitative and quantitative methodologies offer promise, we will not close our eyes to the possibilities exposed through study of positive and postmodern paradigms. From time to time the team may find it necessary to terminate interest in one theory, merge findings into a grander view, or initiate additional analytical channels.