The paper is an attempt at a theory of relations connecting feasible observations/ or measurements/ and feasible decisions/ or controls/ in general cybernetic systems. The theory gives a formal framework and a tool for quantitative analysis of the following facts: 1. An increase in observation possibilities, e.g. an increase of the precision of measurement, enlarging the scope of observation etc., results in an increase in decision possibilities by making more effective decisions possible. This works also in the other direction: if there are more feasible decision, new observations or measurements become available. 2. In the framework of a cybernetic model no decisions and/or observations which generate antinomies can be simultaneously feasible. This creates interesting and important constraints on measurements and decisions in systems which include man or where a human or automatic decision maker is an object of observation, and where the results of observation may be known to this decision maker. 3. The observation/measurement/ takes tome and changes its object and thus the result of observation always refers to past rather than to the present. This normally is due to physical effects through other phenomena, like psychological, may also be important depending on the nature of the object. The facts of group 1 are in a sense opposite to those of groups 2 and 3. This leads to the existence of optimum decision-measurement possibilities. Conditions for this optimum to exist together with its significance for biological and technological system will be discussed. The subject of this paper is of interdisciplinary interest and has been studied, partially and from particular angles, within the framework of control theory/facts of group 1/, mathematical logic/theory of antimonies, principles of mathematics-mainly facts of group 2/, physics/theory of measurement, principles of quantum machanics-mainly facts of group 3/ and philosophy/the classic problems of free will and consciousness/. The relevance of the presented theory to these fields will also be discussed.

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Date created

• 1985

Type

• Document

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• Processing documentation available at: https://wiki.albany.edu/display/SCA/Processing+Ingested+Digital+Files

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• Creative Commons BY-NC-ND Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International

  
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11576afb39e5cd4a779a3912c119ca81

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Part of

8cc5e98280358f60c3a33cc99e75a20e

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23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8

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Collection

System Dynamic Society Records

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Collecting area

• This collection is part of the University Archives