Tektology (sometimes transliterated as tectology) is a term used by Alexander Bogdanov to describe a new universal science that consisted of unifying all social, biological and physical sciences by considering them as systems of relationships and by seeking the organizational principles that underlie all systems. Tektology is now regarded as a precursor of

systems theory Systems theory is the Transdisciplinarity, transdisciplinary study of systems, i.e. cohesive groups of interrelated, interdependent components that can be natural or artificial. Every system has causal boundaries, is influenced by its context, de ...

and related aspects of synergetics. The word "tectology" was introduced by

Ernst Haeckel Ernst Heinrich Philipp August Haeckel (; ; 16 February 1834 – 9 August 1919) was a German zoologist, natural history, naturalist, eugenics, eugenicist, Philosophy, philosopher, physician, professor, marine biology, marine biologist and artist ...

, but Bogdanov used it for a different purpose.

Overview

His work ''Tektology: Universal Organization Science'', published in Russia between 1912 and 1917, anticipated many of the ideas that were popularized later by

Norbert Wiener Norbert Wiener (November 26, 1894 – March 18, 1964) was an American computer scientist, mathematician, and philosopher. He became a professor of mathematics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology ( MIT). A child prodigy, Wiener late ...

Cybernetics Cybernetics is the transdisciplinary study of circular causal processes such as feedback and recursion, where the effects of a system's actions (its outputs) return as inputs to that system, influencing subsequent action. It is concerned with ...

and

Ludwig von Bertalanffy Karl Ludwig von Bertalanffy (19 September 1901 – 12 June 1972) was an Austrian biologist known as one of the founders of general systems theory (GST). This is an interdisciplinary practice that describes systems with interacting components, app ...

in the

General Systems Theory Systems theory is the transdisciplinary study of systems, i.e. cohesive groups of interrelated, interdependent components that can be natural or artificial. Every system has causal boundaries, is influenced by its context, defined by its struc ...

. There are suggestions that both Wiener and von Bertalanffy might have read the German edition of ''Tektology'' which was published in 1928. In ''Sources and Precursors of Bogdanov's Tectology'', James White (1998) acknowledged the intellectual debt of Bogdanov's work on tectology to the ideas of Ludwig Noiré. His work drew on the ideas of Noiré who in the 1870s also attempted to construct a monistic system using the principle of conservation of energy as one of its structural elements. More recently, in her 2016 book ''Molecular Red: Theory for the Anthropocene'', McKenzie Wark attempts to establish Bogdanov as a precursor to contemporary

Anthropocene ''Anthropocene'' is a term that has been used to refer to the period of time during which human impact on the environment, humanity has become a planetary force of change. It appears in scientific and social discourse, especially with respect to ...

theorists, like Donna Haraway, by considering Bogdanov's works of fiction as an extension of his general work in Tectology. In this, Wark also considers Tectology as an alternative to the Soviet state philosophy of

dialectical materialism Dialectical materialism is a materialist theory based upon the writings of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels that has found widespread applications in a variety of philosophical disciplines ranging from philosophy of history to philosophy of scien ...

, which may help in explaining

Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ( 187021 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He was the first head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until Death and state funeral of ...

's vehement opposition to Tectology in his own '' Materialism and Empirio-Criticism''.

Topics in tectology

According to Bogdanov "the aim of Tectology is the systematization of organized

experience Experience refers to Consciousness, conscious events in general, more specifically to perceptions, or to the practical knowledge and familiarity that is produced by these processes. Understood as a conscious event in the widest sense, experience i ...

", through the identification of universal organizational

principle A principle may relate to a fundamental truth or proposition that serves as the foundation for a system of beliefs or behavior or a chain of reasoning. They provide a guide for behavior or evaluation. A principle can make values explicit, so t ...

s: "all things are organizational, all ''complexes'' could only be understood through their organizational character." Bogdanov considered that any complex should correspond to its environment and adapt to it. A stable and organized complex is greater than the sum of its parts. In Tectology, the term 'stability' refers not to a dynamic stability, but to the possibility of preserving the complex in the given environment. A 'complex' is not identical to a 'complicated, a hard-to-comprehend, large unit. In Tectology, Bogdanov made the first 'modern' attempt to formulate the most general

law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior, with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been variously described as a science and as the ar ...

s of

organization An organization or organisation (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English; American and British English spelling differences#-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization), see spelling differences) is an legal entity, entity—such as ...

. Tectology addressed issues such as holistic, emergent phenomena and systemic development. Tectology as a constructive science built elements into a functional entity using general laws of organization. According to his "empirio-monistic" principle (1899), he does not recognize differences between

observation Observation in the natural sciences is an act or instance of noticing or perceiving and the acquisition of information from a primary source. In living beings, observation employs the senses. In science, observation can also involve the percep ...

and

perception Perception () is the organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent and understand the presented information or environment. All perception involves signals that go through the nervous syste ...

and thus creates the beginning of a general empirical, trans-disciplinary science of physical organization, as an expedient unity and precursor of

Systems Theory Systems theory is the Transdisciplinarity, transdisciplinary study of systems, i.e. cohesive groups of interrelated, interdependent components that can be natural or artificial. Every system has causal boundaries, is influenced by its context, de ...

and

Holism Holism is the interdisciplinary idea that systems possess properties as wholes apart from the properties of their component parts. Julian Tudor Hart (2010''The Political Economy of Health Care''pp.106, 258 The aphorism "The whole is greater than t ...

. The "whole" in Tectology, and the laws of its integrity, were derived from biological rather than the physicalistic view of the world. Regarding the three scientific cycles which comprise the basis of Tectology (mathematical, physico-biological, and natural-philosophical), it is from the physico-biological cycle that the central concepts have been taken and universalized. The starting point in Bogdanov's ''Universal Science of Organization - Tectology'' (1913-1922) was that nature has a general, organized character, ''with one set of laws of organization for all objects''. This set of laws also organizes the internal development of the complex units, as implied by Simona Poustilnik's "macro-paradigm", which induces synergistic consequences into an adaptive assembling phenomenon (1995). Bogdanov's visionary view of nature was one of an 'organization' with interconnected systems.

Works

Alexander Bogdanov wrote several works about Tectology: * 1901, ''Poznanie s Istoricheskoi Tochki Zreniya'' (''Knowledge from a Historical Viewpoint''), St. Petersburg, 1901. * 1904, ''Empiriomonizm: Stat'i po Filosofii'' (''Empiriomonism: Articles on Philosophy'') in 3 volumes, Moscow, 1904-1906 * 1912, ''Filosofiya Zhivogo Opyta: Populiarnye Ocherki'' (''Philosophy of Living Experience: Popular Essays''), St. Petersburg, 1912 * 1922 ''Tektologiya: Vseobschaya Organizatsionnaya Nauka'' in 3 volumes, Berlin and Petrograd-Moscow, 1922. * 1980, English translation as ''Essays in Tektology: The General Science of Organization'', trans. George Gorelik, Seaside, CA, Intersystems Publications, 1980.The first English translation of Bogdanov Tektology is due to Peter Dudley and his work at th
Centre for Systems Studies
o
University of Hull
in UK.

References

External links

"Bogdanov and His Work: A Guide to the Published and Unpublished Works of Alexander A. Bogdanov (Malinovsky) 1873-1928"
Reference covering Bogdanov's work,

* ttp://www.ng.ru/science/2002-12-11/15_hamlet.html Red Hamlet* ttp://www.ng.ru/science/2013-11-13/13_russian_science.html Science for the better world
Aleksandr Bogdanov’s Tektology: A Proletarian Science of Construction
Systems theory Holism Russian philosophy Monism

Overview

Topics in tectology

Works

References

Further reading

External links