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Previous studies from our lab have created a simple procedure for single-cell count of bacteria on a paper chip platform using optical detection from a smartphone. The procedure and steps employed are outlined along with the lessons learned and details of certain steps and how the design was optimized. Smartphone optical detection is easy to use, low cost, and potentially field deployable, which can be useful for early and rapid detection of pathogens. Smartphone imaging of a paper microfluidic chip preloaded with antibody-conjugated particles provides an adaptable platform for detection of different bacterial targets. The paper microfluidic chip was fabricated with a multichannel design. Each channel was preloaded with either a negative control of bovine serum albumin (BSA) conjugated particles, anti-Salmonella Typhimurium-conjugated particles with varying amounts (to cover different ranges of assay), or anti-Escherichia coli-conjugated particles. Samples were introduced to the paper microfluidic chip using pipetting. Antigens of Salmonella Typhimurium traveled through the channel by capillary action confined within the paper fibers surrounded by the hydrophobic barrier. The paper channel was observed to act as a filter for unwanted particles and contaminants found in field samples. Serial dilutions of known concentrations of bacterial targets were also tested using this procedure to construct a standard curve prior to the assays. The antibody-conjugated particles were able to immunoagglutinate which was quantified through evaluation of Mie scatter intensity. This Mie scattering was quantified in images taken with a smartphone at an optimized angle and distance. Mie scatter simulation provided a method of optimizing the experimental setup and could translate easily to other types of target sample matrices. A smartphone application was developed to help the user position the smartphone optimally in relation to the paper microfluidic chip. The application integrated both image capturing capability and a simple image processing algorithm that calculated bacteria concentrations. The detection limit was at a single-cell level with a total assay time ranging from 90 to less than 60 s depending on the target.

This chapter examines the short term production, transportation and inventory planning problems encountered in the fine-paper industry. After positioning the problems in the context of a general supply chain planning system for the pulp and paper industry, a comprehensive synchronized production-distribution model is gradually developed. First, a model for the dynamic lot-sizing of intermediate products on a single paper machine with a predetermined production cycle is proposed. The model also plans the production and inventory of finished products. Then, we consider the lot-sizing of intermediate products on multiple parallel paper machines with a predetermined production sequence. Finally, simultaneous production and distribution planning for a single mill multiple distribution centers network is studied by considering different transportation modes between the mill and its Distribution Centers (DCs).

The research reported in this paper concerns the ongoing development of a Knowledge Intensive Sketching (KiS) framework through which designers are supported in foreseeing directly from their paper-based sketches the relevant life-cycle consequences of their ‘component form’ solution concepts. The goal of the KiS framework is to retain the important characteristics of freehand sketching, i.e. pencil and paper, whilst at the same time exploit the benefits of Knowledge Intensive CAD technology for proactively guiding designers in generating life-oriented solutions as from early design.

We determine a duality between broadcast and multiple access channels that can be used to obtain the capacity region and optimal transmission strategy for one channel based on the capacity-achieving transmission strategy and region for the dual channel. This duality result in applicable to additive Gaussian noise and fading channels for several different notions of fading channel capacity, including ergodic capacity, outage capacity, and minimum rate capacity. We show that duality can be used to obtain any of these capacities for the fading broadcast channel from the same capacity on the dual MAC channel, and vice versa. We then apply this general result to obtain the minimum rate capacity of the fading multiple access channel, which also yields the ergodic and outage capacity as special cases. Next we turn our attention to broadcast channels with multiple antennas at the transmitter and receiver (the MIMO channel). Since this channel is in general non-degraded, its capacity region remains an unsolved problem. We establish a duality between the achievable region of the MIMO broadcast channel using Costa’s “dirty-paper” coding and the capacity region of the MIMO multiple-access channel, which is easy to compute. We also show that the dirty paper achievable region yields the sum-rate capacity of the MIMO broadcast channel.

Harmonisation in information systems modeling can only be achieved if there is agreement on issues and approaches among those who build and reason about information systems. In the past there has been a severe lack of agreement on what the central issues are when building information systems, as well as disagreement on how such systems should be built. This situation taken into consideration the WG8.1 FRISCO group has taken on a draconian task when trying to forge agreement and harmonisation of all of the competing views on information systems.

The era of employing a grand monolithic approach to develop data processing systems is coming to an end. Systems developers are now realizing that there are many different ways to specify and program systems. While the traditional IF… THEN, DO WHILE approach is popular in many situations, it is far from being the best or only way. For instance, a medical diagnosis system might be implemented best with rules and an inference engine. In other situations, conditioning a neural network or genetic algorithm could produce the desired results much more efficiently. Elsewhere, a predicate logic or functional expression would be the best way to specify an application. In other words, if a system can be specified in many ways, why not choose the mix of approaches best for the problem at hand? Why be bound to only one way of doing things, when a combination of approaches might produce a result that is more economical, accurate, understandable, and elegant?

This chapter presents further issues on the validity, importance and usefulness of studies about diagnostic tools, including screening methods. These topics complement the discussion on measurement instruments presented in chapter 4.

While methods for retrieving documents from large information repositories have improved a lot, presentation of the retrieved documents still leaves a lot to be desired. Important information on documents is usually presented as a textual listing of available metadata attributes such as document size, author information, date of creation, and so on. This requires the user to read and abstract from the presented metainformat ion.

The notion of computational model is central to the Reference Model for Open Distributed Processing. It defines an abstract model for distributed computations and characterizes at the same time the functionality of a supporting distributed virtual machine. Most current distributed systems, including e.g. the CORBA platforms, have converged on a subset of this computational model. In this paper, we review the model, providing a formal characterization for it, and we discuss various directions for extensions, considering in particular different trends in distributed systems construction.

This paper argues that most workflow management support systems are vulnerable due to the single database architecture upon which they are based. Furthermore, the single server architecture creates a performance bottleneck when large quantities of workflows are being managed.

A search was made on the CAB ABSTRACTS database for all scientific papers by the 16 speakers at this Symposium (Intercellular Signalling in the Mammary Gland, Hannah Research Institute, Ayr, UK, 13–15 April 1994) published since 1984. A total of 475 records was retrieved from the database.

The four papers of this section deal with rather different subjects. Nonetheless, I will try to emphasize certain common points in the approaches.

Writing a research paper is an integral part of research, not just a tiresome appendage to swell your curriculum vitae. You must guarantee that your research was ethical, that your data are accurate, that you have concealed no relevant information, that you have not submitted the same data in another form to another journal, and that all the authors named have taken part in the research and in the preparation of your paper.

In paper mills, the speed of paper web has been increasing all the time and the speeds may be in excess of 120 km/h (60–70 miles/h). High speeds are also needed in slitter-winders to manage the continuous production of paper from the machine despite the roll changes. It is clear that at such speeds the tension of the moving paper has to be known; in particular, the tension profile across the machine direction since the profile may contain tension peaks that break the web even though the average tension may be acceptable.

IJP is among one of several non-impact printing technologies which has recently established a very definite niche in the competitive and burgeoning computer printer market. The basic principle of UP is to force an inviscid ink through a small nozzle or array of nozzles onto paper and form an image by means of computer control. Basically there are two modes of generating ink drops, viz., continuous and impulse. In view of the current and projected range of print speeds, drop sizes, print resolution and impact velocities, continuous and impulse UP demands some rather unique paper properties to fulfill print quality requirements.

The research of the past several years has produced a substantial body of knowledge concerning the design of parallel algorithms and their implementation on various architectures. In many ways the enterprise has been highly succesful: a number of fundamental principles of parallel algorithm design and parallel communication have emerged, and the foundations of a rich mathematical theory have been laid. Despite these successes, the theoretical work has had relatively little influence on developments in parallel computer architecture, or on the application of parallel computation techniques to fields such as computer vision, artificial intelligence, combinatorial optimization and scientific computing. We must continue to work on the development of models of parallel computation that are sufficiently abstract to support a theoretical investigation, and yet reflect the objectives, constraints and design considerations that arise in practice.

This paper presents a schema that attempts to embrace all graphic language. The essence of the schema is shown in a matrix which presents a number of theoretical possibilities in terms of approaches to graphic language. One axis of the matrix describes the methods of configuration of graphic language, using such terms as pure linear, linear interrupted, list, linear branching, matrix, non-linear directed, non-linear open. The other axis describes the modes of symbolization of graphic language, using four somewhat crude categories: verbal/numerical, pictorial and verbal/numerical, pictorial, schematic. Numerous, examples are shown to clarify terms and the underlying concepts they describe. It is emphasized that the matrix is a device for directing thinking, rather than a means of defining graphic language. The paper is written from the standpoint of a practising graphic designer. The matrix is used to illustrate the wide range of approaches open to us in graphic language and the effect this is assumed to have on reading/viewing strategies and cognitive processes. It is mggested that the matrix is useful in focusing attention on two fundamental questions that ought always to be asked when deciding how a graphic message should be communicated: What should be the mode of symbolization and what should be the method of configuration? Legibility and related research is briefly reviewed in order to establish what light it throws on these questions; with a few notable exceptions it is found wanting. It is suggested that there is a need for more research that crosses the boundaries of the cells of the matrix. This paper is not the culmination of a sustained programme of research and brings no firm evidence to bear on any aspect of graphic language. It is the contribution of a graphic designer who has had the opportunity of associating with research workers concerned with the evaluation of graphic language, and is written as a tutorial paper to stimulate thought and discussion. It is an attempt to define the scope of graphic language and to show relationships between different approaches to it that have been, and can be, used. Throughout the paper, the totality of graphic language and its specifically graphic variables are emphasized. Though the approach may appear to be somewhat theoretical, it is intended that it should have practical implications.

This paper is an introduction to three further technical papers on advanced teleoperation. We first give a brief history of this research project, recording the part played by Jean Vertut. We present the basic concepts of advanced teleoperation, starting with the necessity for coexistence of autonomy and transparency, emphasizing the virtual level in relation to the real level. In the following section we introduce the technical papers, the first of which is devoted to generalized master slave control and supervisory systems, the second to generalized information feedback, and the third to a description of an integrated experimental test bed. The paper ends with some thoughts on the future of advanced teleoperation.

The evaluation of energy resources is a vital component in the determination of energy strategy on which the formulation of energy policy is based. It is however an uncertain art since the existence of only a portion of mineral reserves can be considered as a fact, the remainder being at best speculative. W. C. Stitt’s paper addresses problems in the state of the art of modeling of crude oil and natural gas resources in the USA giving examples of the type of problems encountered. His physical description of the resource base utilizes the McKelvey diagram in which the physical characteristics of the deposits are distilled into two attributes, one of quantity by the degree of certainty and the other by cost of extraction. The values of these attributes are the input information required for the potential supply functions used in energy policy analysis. The known reserves usually represent only enough of the resource to underpin commercial operations to the appropriate planning horizon of the industry; information for periods beyond this can only be inferred from current exploration data which can be highly variable inquality.

Widlocher’s paper clarifies, in a very relevant way, an essential distinction in the use of the words and concept of intervening variables. On one hand, intervening variables appear as a sort of missing link in a causal chain of events, some of which only are known. In this case intervening variables refer to events awaiting for explicit description. On the other hand, intervening variables have the status of a law, as Widlocher calls it, or, as we would prefer to call it, in a somewhat more vague and less ambitious manner, a construct. In this case, one will not expect to uncover events formerly inaccessible to inquiry, but only to disprove or to confirm a more or less consistent set of relationships.

This paper is a brief survey of non-adaptive dynamic control of manipulation robots. We shall concentrate mainly on the problems of control synthesis of executive control level, but as in some approaches tactical and executive control level are indistinguishable, we have to mention also some problems concerning trajectories planning and their generation.

Reading text and listening to speech involve a sequence of processing stages that take the language user from the spoken or written message to meaning. This paper describes each stage in an information processing model. At each stage of the model there are storage and process components: the storage component defines the type of information available at the stage of processing; the process component specifies the procedures that operate on the information held in the corresponding storage component. The model is used heuristically to incorporate data and theory from a variety of approaches to reading and speech perception. Some relevant issues are the properties of the various storage structures, the dynamics of the functional processes, and the active utilization of the various sources of knowledge available to the language receiver. One central assumption is that analogous structures and processes occur in speech perception and reading. It is valuable, therefore, to ask similar experimental questions in both areas, and to attempt to develop a unitary model of both reading and speech perception. A session on Reading and Listening must be motivated by the belief that these two skills are not unrelated. And, in fact, it has been commonly believed by many that reading is somehow a skill parasitic to listening: that is, all that is necessary in order to read is to translate the written word into its spoken counterpart, and then to listen to the message. Since most literate people learn to listen long before they learn to read, it seems natural that reading instruction should exploit what the child knows about listening. Faced with a new word in written text, the child is encouraged to decode it (sound it out) on the assumption that the spoken rendering will more likely be recognized. The primacy of speech has been one motivating influence on theories of reading that view reading as a process of going from print to some speech code enroute to the meaning (Gough, 1972). Since it is a common belief that man spoke and listened long before he wrote and read, one could also argue that language learning recapitulates the development of spoken and written language. However Wrolstad (1976), in a stimulating and fascinating manifesto, argues the reverse.

A technological display is the interface between the human and technological systems. This tutorial is concerned with computer-based systems and displays that enable humans to interact with computers, and most of the examples are taken from real-time systems. It is with these systems that display design becomes most critical, since the human must respond accurately under speed stress. The displays must help the human comprehend complex and rapidly changing system events. Due to limitations in display size, the data are often highly coded and difficult to interpret. The learn- ability and memorability of displays are therefore important aspects of display design. The field of technological displays can be described in terms of certain broad categories. From a presentation point of view, displays can be classified as either alphanumeric or graphic. Within the field of alphanumeric CRT displays, a further distinction occurs between the conversational mode, where input is limited to a specific CRT location, and the formatted display that allows entry at pre-specified locations anywhere on a fixed mask. These types of displays are illustrated with examples from real-time telephone traffic management systems. The fundamental display design process consists of eight major steps that carry the designer from the initial analysis of the operating system to the detailed formatting of each display. At each stage the designer makes decisions based on adequate knowledge of human needs and limitations. Specific areas for additional psychological research are pointed out. In its broadest sense, the technological display is any presentation of data associated with an engineering or scientific discipline. To narrow things somewhat, it is necessary to distinguish between real-time displays and non-real-time displays. The distinction has more to do with the intended mode of use by the human than with the data or their method of generation. A display is an aid to the performance of some task. The user of the real-time display is involved in tasks that force him to decode and encode information within a rapidly changing environment. The speedometer in a car is an example. It is updated frequently and the driver needs to obtain information in a brief glance. If the display lags behind the speed of the auto or if it is difficult to determine quickly the current reading, the display is poorly designed. Thus, in general, real-time displays have the advantage that they can be objectively evaluated by the criteria of speed and accuracy of use.

Magali Bovet’s main point is that people take to training experiments for a variety of reasons and with a number of different aims. She argues that we ought to classify these experiments into different types and she surely is right.

The majority of analog recorders utilize either strip charts or circular charts. The strip charts, supplied in rolls, have the great advantage that they can operate continuously for long periods without need of replacement. Circular charts, on the other hand, must be replaced periodically, and hence are used mostly for recording slowly changing variables, a single chart to last, perhaps, one day or one week (Figure 6-1).

Dr. S.R. Caplan (Israel) summarised his work on the self adaptive control of energy conversion and its relation to the mechanical behaviour of muscle.

In the last few years bureaucratic procedures didn't show a significant reduction in the volume of paper documents created. In order to reduce the huge amount of space for archiving and preserving documents and to speed up the secarh process, a semantic-based dematerialization process should be performed. In this paper we describe a novel system that manages several kind of bureaucratic documents in the e-gov domain, automatically extracts several interesting information and produces a suitable semantic representation that may be considered as the first step towards a full automated document management system. © 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.

SUMMARY SSME reflects both paradigm and actual shifts in the world economy, and represents an opportunity to reassess the relevance of and instructional methods used in undergraduate academic programs in computer science and IT. This paper outlines a strategy being considered at a minority serving institution, where concerns for student recruitment, retention and career success are paramount. An incremental adoption approach is proposed that exploits existing opportunities to give students multiple exposures to services as endusers, software developers and designers, and business/system analysts. INTRODUCTION The adoption of new paradigms is challenging. Things to overcome include organizational inertia, characterized by a commitment to “do things the way we always have done them.” In many ways, industry and academia react to change in a similar way. Fortunately, conditions for organizational change are more favorable when organizations realize that survival may be at stake or that an unprecedented opportunity presents itself. Business challenges related to market share and survival parallel current challenges in academia such as declining enrollments, student retention, and the place of computer science in the new world order. The Department of Computer and Information Sciences (CIS) at Florida AM and (2) student exposures to these emerging areas are spread across existing courses in the curriculum. Services Science Management and Engineering (SSME) is a recent movement that recognizes the worldwide growth in the services sector overall. SSME recognizes the multi-disciplinary skill set needed to innovate, implement and support services, and the variety of situations for which IT services are contained in an SSME solution. This position paper presents a strategy for inserting SSME into undergraduate experience. The approach is evolutionary since SSME is an evolving discipline. To date, most SSME academic programs are offered at the graduate level. It is our position that efforts at the undergraduate level are needed to create a pipeline of students who will study SSME at the graduate. BACKGROUND AND RELATED WORK The challenge of sustaining effective and relevant computer science curricula is well documented. During the process of preparing the ACM/IEEE

The handling of insider attacks is a significant technical challenge as little assurance theory and design practice exists to guide the design of effective, credible countermeasures for large systems and applications. Much of the relevant theory has focused on insider attacks on individual security protocols and smallscale applications. In this position paper, we suggest that confidence in a system’s resilience to insider attacks can emerge by the application of well-accepted survivability principles and design methods. We caution, however, that different tradeoffs emerge in applying these principles to practical designs, thereby requiring a careful balance among the costs of countering insider attacks, recovery from attack, and attack deterrence, and between the fine granularity of access permissions and ability to administer these permissions is a safe manner. In view of the dearth of practical solutions for surviving insider attacks in any significant-size system, we suggest that experiments in applying well-accepted principles and design methods to critical subsystems (e.g., user authentication, DNS) are necessary to provide effective and quantifiable assurances.

The intention in this position paper is to propose a possible new future for the technology diffusion research community, based on the integral approach of American philosopher Ken Wilber. The trends and current state of technology diffusion research are reviewed, and relevant aspects of Wilber’s integral approach and its possible contributions are described. These aspects include Wilber’s basic quadrants model and integral methodological pluralism, as well as the metapractices from which they arise.

This short paper deals with the similarities (for teaching) between computer science as a discipline and other disciplines: for example it is like maths in one way and like medicine in another, and like English in yet another. The paper addresses the question as to how — as teachers — we can (and should) use examples from the teaching of those disciplines to enhance our own.

“Forsoksgymnaset in Oslo” was an experiment in School Democracy that started classes in automatic data processing in the fall of 1968 as a part of school mathematics in the 11th year. We started simple programming in FORTRAN on punched cards, off line. Later we had a teletype terminal with paper tape, changed to the BASIC language, and ran programs online by telephone to a distant computer. We also designed the logic simulator “Benjamin”, with four “And”, “Or”, and “Not” elements, battery and lamps, which could be connected in logical networks to be studied. In 1970, we arranged two two-day seminars for teachers during the Christmas and the summer holidays and presented the whole course. We did this eight times and helped to qualify many teachers. The first Examen Artium in Data was organised in June 1970.

In this position paper it is argued that generic theories of the information concept will be an obstacle to the Information Systems discipline assuming intellectual leadership of the information portfolio associated with the growth of computing technologies beyond the organization.

This white paper examines several dimensions of information integrity. It then explains why it is so imperative that we mobilize appropriate resources to create and implement a new, universal framework for achieving information integrity.

In years past, it was somewhat difficult to make up one’s mind about the multiple types of error correcting coding schemes, which were categorized mainly into convolutional or block codes, with many variations in each family. Are there such great differences between all these codes? Without giving formal answers, this short paper translates a personal opinion that was initially conceived thanks to the ideas of Dave Forney.

This short paper is concerned with standards for scientific languages and library modules from the point of view of an organization developing scientific software. The author represents a company that develops, markets and distributes numerical and statistical software, but the paper is intended to be relevant to any organization involved with scientific software.

This thematic paper based on experiences obtained with X-CITTIC (1995) in semiconductor supply chains introduces the concepts “Agility” and “Human Sensor” in “Virtual Enterprises” found in the announced HUTOP (1998) project.

Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) is the electronic exchange of standard business documents in a structured and computer-processable form. The purpose of EDI is to enable a quick way to process business documents. EDI also facilitates paperless trading and it is a new way to conduct business. EDI solves some problems in the traditional paper document flow, including: Process delay caused by physical delivery of documents, and the reentering of data by the trading partners; Low accuracy of data that have been re-entered by the trading partners; High labor cost for re-entering data; Unexpected document loss; Uncertainty of payment source.

The eloquence with which Massey advocated the use of the cut-off rate parameter for the coordinated design of modulation and coding in communication systems caused many to redirect their thinking about how communication systems should be designed. Underlying his recommendation is the view that modulation and demodulation should be designed to realize a good discrete channel for encoding and decoding, rather than the prevailing view at the time, and still the view of many, that bit error-probability should be optimized. In this short paper, some of the research influenced by Massey’s insightful suggestions on this subject is reviewed.

The study of metabolic cascades is often associated with the notion of ‘switches’, that is, mechanisms that can exist in one of two defined states, usually called ‘ON’ and ‘OFF’. A number of workers have become interested in the possibility of designing digital and neural-like circuits based on the metabolic cascade1–3. In this short paper I would like to describe some metabolic digital ‘devices’ based on the cascade cycle. One of the most basic components in digital electronics is the NAND gate. This gate is important because almost any other logical device can be constructed from it; for example, NOR gates, clocks and flip-flops are easily built using particular configurations of NAND gates4. What follows will be a description of a basic metabolic NAND gate, a NOT gate, a novel metabolic ‘clock’ based around the NOT gate and a metabolic flip-flop.

The unique nature of citrus fruit lends itself to unique processing methods. Citrus processing consists mainly of receiving and storage of fruit, fruit washing and grading, juice extraction, juice finishing or screening, heat treatment, packaging, and storing. Blending of previously prepared or purchased juices is very common, along with the manufacture of byproducts such as pulp wash juices, oils, aromas, animal feeds, pectins, marmalades, jellies, drinks, flavors, wines, vinegars, fuels, and many more. The facilities required to manufacture the vast array of citrus products combine in many varied schemes depending on a host of factors. Equipment can be obtained in many ways. Some of the most common methods are purchasing, leasing, renting, constructing, and even borrowing equipment. It is the intent of this chapter to describe some of the basic processing equipment and procedures used in citrus processing. The processing of citrus byproducts not directly associated with juice processing itself will be discussed in Chapter 11.

The implementation of these hypertext concepts has resulted in a changing of the roles played by a document author and a document reader. “The figure of the hypertext author approaches, even if it does not entirely merge with, that of the reader; the functions of reader and writer become more deeply entwined with each other than ever before. This transformation and near merging of roles is but the latest stage in the convergence of what had once been two very different activities” (Landow 1994).

Due to growing interest in using natural language interfaces, it is appropriate to begin discussing their evaluation. This position paper presents the point of view that natural language interfaces offer special problems for evaluation, compared to problems encountered with other computer software. If ignored, such problems will make evaluation ineffectual. First, the paper describes the purposes and dimensions of problems in such an evaluation; differing purposes dictate differing approaches to evaluating natural language interfaces. Then, the paper points out some issues that turn out to be red herrings, and suggests a modest proposal that covers much of the broad spectrum of difficult issues involved. Since some of the issues and problems are common to both expert systems and natural language interfaces, comparisons of issues in evaluation of expert systems is also provided.

In radiography picture forming involves either fluoroscopy or registration on special photographic film. Images can also be recorded on photographic paper, Polaroid film and paper, and on various color films; however, such applications are exceptional.

The first part of this paper outlines the important features of distribution maps as used in botany, describes how they are constructed and discusses the introduction of machine-mapping methods in the early 1960’s. Examples of hand-plotted and machine-plotted maps are given. The main techniques for the automation of mapping plant ranges are described as well as the special capabilities which computers provide for mapping. A comparison is made of the different kinds of machines which can be used for machine-mapping from the standpoint of Input, Output, Control, Operation, Restrictions, Advantages and Disadvantages.

My “position paper” can be summed up in the following sentence: There are strong scientific, technological and political reasons why massively parallel, (neural network) computation should be integrated into mainstream computer science. What follows is elaboration.

It is reported about the development of advanced control algorithms which are to be implemented in a computer control system for a pulp digester house. The goal of these algorithms is to control the production rate, to improve the quality of pulp and to reduce steam consumption. The control functions considered in the paper include the following: batch sequencing, digester heating control, modification of cooking temperature, prediction of pulp quality during the cooking phase, etc.

This short paper does not attempt to present either an exhaustive or a comprehensive critique of general systems research. Its purpose is rather to raise a number of interrelated issues which the author feels are worthy of a wider discussion. These issues are raised in connection with those areas of systems research which are intended to improve our understanding of social and economic systems. This is not, we feel, a serious limitation since it is in the application of systems research to the social and economic problems of mankind that explicit considerations of methodology have become most important and controversial.