The magic ring : systems thinking approach to control systems / Piero Mella.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Mella, Piero, author.

Series:

Contemporary Systems Thinking

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Control theory.

System theory.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (875 pages) : illustrations

Edition:

2nd ed.

Place of Publication:

Cham, Switzerland : Springer, [2021]

Summary:

This book presents a new understanding on how control systems truly operate, and explains how to recognize, simulate, and improve control systems in all fields of activity. It also reveals the pervasive, ubiquitous and indispensable role of control processes in our life and the need to develop a "control-oriented thinking"--based on uncomplicated but effective models derived from systems thinking--that is, a true "discipline of control." Over the book's thirteen chapters, Piero Mella shows that there are simple control systems (rather than complex ones) that can easily help us to manage complexity without drawing upon more sophisticated control systems. It begins by reviewing the basic language of systems thinking and the models it allows users to create. It then introduces the control process, presenting the theoretical structure of three simple control systems we all can observe in order to gain fundamental knowledge from them about the basic structure of a control system. Then, it presents the anatomy of the simplest "magic ring" and the general theoretical model of any control system. This is followed by an introduction to a general typology of control systems and a broader view of control systems by investigating multi-lever control systems and multi-objective systems. The book undertakes the concepts through various environments, increasingly broader in scope to suggest to readers how to recognize therein control systems manifestations in everyday life and in natural phenomena. Updated for the 2nd edition, new chapters explore control systems regulating the biological environment and the organizations, with an in-depth study of the control of quality, productivity, production, stocks and costs. Finally, it concludes by dealing with the learning process, problem-solving, and designing the logical structure of control systems.

Contents:

Intro

Preface to the First Edition

Preface to the Second Edition

Contents

List of Figures

List of Tables

Part I: Discovering the "Ring"

Chapter 1: The Language of Systems Thinking for Control Systems

1.1 The Sixth Discipline: The Discipline of Control Systems

1.2 The Fifth Discipline: The Five Basic Rules of Systems Thinking

1.3 The Construction of Models Based on Systems Thinking: The Rings

1.4 From Systems Thinking to System Dynamics: A Simulation of a Dynamic System

1.5 Two Fundamental Laws of Systems Thinking

1.6 Systems Archetypes: Three Relevant Structures of Human Behavior-The Archetypes of the Three Myopias

1.7 Complementary Material

1.7.1 Reinforcing Loop: Arms Escalation

1.7.2 Reinforcing Loops: Virus Explosion

1.7.3 Multiple Loops: The Law of Accelerating Returns

1.7.4 The General Law of Dynamic Instability

1.7.5 The Law of Dynamic Instability: Richardson's Model

1.7.6 The Law of Dynamic Instability: Prey-Predator Populations

1.7.7 The Law of Dynamic Instability: Counteracting the Spread of a Virus

1.7.8 Senge's Archetypes List Expanded

1.7.9 The "Six" Disciplines of Learning Organizations

1.8 Summary

Chapter 2: The Ring: The General Structure of Control Systems

2.1 The Control Process

2.2 The Logical Structure of Control Systems in the Language of Systems Thinking

2.3 The Ring in Action: The Heuristic Model of a Control System

2.4 Some Technical Notes

2.5 Continuous Single-Lever Control System Without Delays

2.6 Discrete Single-Lever Control System Without Delay

2.7 Control System with On-Off Lever

2.8 Continuous Single-Lever Control System with Delay

2.9 The Technical Structure of a Single-Lever Control System: The Chain of Control

2.10 Management and Governance of the Control System.

2.11 Design and Realization of the Control System

2.12 Delays and Disturbances in the Control: Variants of the Control Model

2.13 Strengthening and Precision of Control Systems

2.14 Connections and Interferences Among Single-Lever Control Systems

2.15 Areas of Application of the General Model

2.16 Complementary Material

2.16.1 Simulation Tools

2.16.2 Control of an Elevator

2.16.3 Searching for a Street, a Page, and a Word

2.16.4 The Trajectories of a Car and a Boat

2.16.5 Shower with Two Delays

2.16.6 Direct and Inverse Control

2.16.7 Simulation of an On-Off System: The Hot and Cold Air Conditioner

2.16.8 Simulation of Two Interfering Showers Using Powersim

2.16.9 Feedforward Control

2.16.10 The Engineering Definition of Control Systems

2.16.11 An Analytical Appendix: The Optimal Value of the Lever and the Optimal Control Period in Non-symmetrical Systems

2.17 Summary

Chapter 3: The Ring Variety: A Basic Typology

3.1 Manual and Automatic Control Systems: Cybernetic Systems

3.2 Quantitative and Qualitative Control Systems: Attainment and Recognition Control Systems

3.3 Steering and Halt Control Systems

3.4 Fixed- and Variable-Objective Systems (or Systems of "Pursuit")

3.5 Collision, Anticollision, and Alignment Systems

3.6 Tendential and Combinatory Control Systems

3.7 Parallel or Serial Connections

3.8 Holarchies of Control Systems

3.9 Complementary Material

3.9.1 Some Well-Known Cybernetic Systems

3.9.2 Halt Control Systems

3.9.3 Biometric Systems of Recognition and Identification

3.9.4 Explorative Systems

3.9.5 Looking Up a Word in the Dictionary

3.9.6 Achilles and the Tortoise: Zeno's Paradox

3.9.7 Serial Systems: The Oven and the Boiler.

3.9.8 Qualitative Control Systems: Procedure to Determine the States of Variety of the Qualitative Variables

3.10 Summary

Chapter 4: The Ring Completed: Multilever and Multiobjective Control Systems

4.1 Dual-Lever Control System with Mutually Dependent Levers

4.2 Dual-Lever Control System with Independent Levers: Control Strategy

4.3 Impulse Control Systems

4.4 Multilever Control Systems

4.5 Multilayer Control Systems

4.6 Multiobjective Control Systems and Control Policies

4.7 Optimal Strategies and Policies: Two General Preference Models

4.8 Complementary Material

4.8.1 Flying in a Hot Air Balloon

4.8.2 Submerging in a Submarine

4.8.3 A Multilever System: Mix of N Components

4.8.4 Control of a Mobile Platform

4.8.5 Industrial Robots and Movement Systems

4.8.6 Focusing

4.8.7 Demand, Supply, and Price: Dual-Objective Control System

4.8.8 Ordering of the Objectives to Define Control Policy: The Direct Comparison Procedure

4.8.9 The Standard Gamble Method

4.9 Summary

Chapter 5: The Ring: Observation and Design

5.1 How to Recognize or Design the Logical Structure of a Control System

5.2 Symptomatic and Structural Control

5.3 Effectiveness and Efficiency of Control Systems

5.4 Strengtheners, Turbos, and Multilevers

5.5 Risk of Failure of the Control Process Due to Structural Causes

5.6 Risks of Failure of the Control Process Due to some Characteristics of the Variables to be Controlled

5.7 Risks of Failure of the Control Process Due to Improper Levers: "Shifting the Burden" archetype

5.8 Pathologies of Control: Discouragement, Insatiability, Persistence, and Underestimation

5.9 Problem Solving and Control Systems

5.10 Problem Solving and the Leverage Effect

5.11 The Principles of Systems Thinking Applied to Problem Solving

5.12 Complementary Material.

5.12.1 Multicriteria Decision-Making

5.13 Summary

Part II: The Magic of the Ring

Chapter 6: The Magic Ring in Action: Individuals

6.1 Magic Rings Operating on a Wonderful Day

6.2 Rings Operating in the Domestic Environment

6.3 Overhead Rings in the External Microenvironment

6.4 Rings Acting in the External Macro Environment

6.5 Planetary Rings: "Gaia" and Daisyworld

6.6 Control System for Global Warming: The Myopia Archetypes in Action

6.7 Rings Acting on Earthquakes and Tsunamis

6.8 Rings Acting on the Human Body

6.9 Control Systems for Survival as Psychophysical Entities

6.10 Rings That Regulate Biological Clocks

6.11 Complementary Material

6.11.1 The Water Cycle

6.11.2 Daisyworld Dynamics

6.12 Summary

Chapter 7: The Magic Ring in Action: Social Environment and Sustainability

7.1 Social Environment

7.2 The Rings Regulating Social Systems: The Control of Coexistence

7.3 Rings That Maintain Autopoiesis in Social Systems

7.4 Rings That Regulate Some Fundamental Variables in Social Systems

7.5 Rings Within Collectivities as Combinatory Systems

7.6 The Control of Combinatory Systems

7.7 Sustainability of Social Behavior, Myopia Archetypes in Action, Population Growth, and Commons Depletion

7.8 Rings Operating in Social Systems as Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS)

7.9 Change Management in a Complex World: The PSC Model

7.10 Complementary Material

7.10.1 Models and Classes of Combinatory Systems

7.10.2 The Heuristic Models Revealing the Modus Operandi of Some Relevant Social Phenomena Following the Combinatory Systems Model

7.10.3 The Combinatory Automaton to Simulate the Buzzing in an Indoor Locale

7.10.4 Two Modern Tragedies of the Commons

7.10.5 The PSC Model Applied to Stereotypes and Gender Discrimination

7.11 Summary.

Chapter 8: The Magic Ring in Action: The Biological Environment

8.1 Magic Rings in the Macro Biological Environment

8.2 Magic Rings That Regulate the Dynamics of Populations

8.3 Dynamics of a Population Without Growth Limits

8.4 Dynamics of a Population with Limits to Its Available Resources: Malthusian Dynamics

8.5 Dynamics of Interacting Populations Forming a Trophic Food Chain: Volterra-Lotka Model

8.6 Natural Endogenous and Artificial External Controls of Two Interacting Populations

8.7 Magic Rings That Regulate the Dynamics of Three or More Populations Comprising an Ecosystem

8.8 Qualitative Dynamics of Populations-Evolution: The Framework

8.9 Magic Rings That Regulate the Qualitative Dynamics of Populations Over Time

8.10 Combinatory Systems as a Tool for Simulating the Dynamics Regarding the Spread of a Favorable Mutation

8.11 Qualitative Dynamics Interacting with Quantitative Dynamics

8.12 Evolution of Non-biological "Species"

8.13 Evolution in Networks of Organizations: Production Networks

8.14 The Rules of Selfish Behavior of Nodes (Modules) in Production Networks: Evolutionary Qualitative Dynamics of Nodes

8.15 The Laws of Production Networks

8.16 Complementary Material

8.16.1 The Nodes (Modules) Forming the Production Networks

8.16.2 The Genesis of Production Networks

8.16.3 The Evolution of Production Networks: The Ghost in the Production Machine

8.17 Summary

Chapter 9: The Magic Ring in Action: Organizations

9.1 Rings That Allow Organizations to Exist as Autopoietic, Homeostatic, and Teleonomic Social Systems

9.2 Viable Systems View

9.3 Organizations as Efficient Systems of Transformation

9.4 From MOEST to Management Control and Performance Management

9.5 The Rings in Macro Management Control: The Objectives of the Strategic Rings: EVF and EVA.

9.6 The Objectives of the Operational Rings: Roe* and Roi*.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

3-030-64194-5

OCLC:

1244806377