General Systems and Systems Engineering

One of the main lines of thought in General Systems is the transfer of system concepts from one field to another. There has been fruitful application of such theoretical concepts from engineering to other fields such as biology. In this paper, an attempt is made to apply concepts from biology to the practice of systems engineering. The relation of systems engineering to other fields is discussed, utilizing an intellectual framework based on the concepts of speciation and competition between species. The internal social structure of the profession and of individual organizations is considered, using the concept of competition within a species. Examples are drawn from biology to illustrate the points at issue.