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Engineering Systems Integration
Similarly, for the event-centric business model and the organization-centric
business model, the determination of frames and the systems engineering
framework justly and logically is constructed as with the product- or servicecentric business model. For all three types, various conceptions of wholes
and parts have been developed independently and adapted to situations
great and greater, including a definitive discussion of parts based on the
formal theories of mereology from Les ´niewski and the works of Leonard
and Goodman (Leonard and Goodman 1940). A key tenet of holism in general systems theory builds on the reciprocity of wholes and parts (Ashby
1962) and the notion that objects are simultaneously wholes and parts
(Koestler 1968). This evolution of the relations between objects was extended
in sociology (Kuhn 1974) to recognize the observation that knowing something about a system portends a level of information about another part of
the system. Next, we determine that while there may be differences between
objects, there are representative objects that are descriptive of a type of
object, described as mereological pluralism—whereby an object may well
have systematic differences with respect to their whole or their parts—the
principle of extensionality (Korman 2007). And finally, our objects must
exhibit mereological constancy (Simon 1987). Specifically, over time the
object remains the object maintaining its essential qualities and its properties. The object’s traits may change because of the environmental influences
on the object and the attributes may change due to aging (for example).
However, the object remains the object in its wholeness. For example, a 1928
car ditched in a canyon, overgrown with vegetation, and long forgotten still
retains the intrinsic (e.g., basic, essential, and fundamental) qualities of the
original 1928 car (i.e., the car that was), with paint giving way to rust, and
seat leather pecked to feather nests. The objects that comprise the car remain
(even if some were looted).
Prototype-Based Ontology, Logic, and Mereology
We introduce an ontological structure of integration, the starting point and
perspective of which incorporates both objective and subjective components.
The objective components of the structure are based on objects, EMMI, functions, and behaviors due to same. Since integration by human actions is
sociologically based, a subjective component is essential to capture the
notion of the processes used to build something. Humans use objects to
build and integrate objects. An object is a structure of anything that receives,
transforms, and sends EMMI. An object can also serve as a means to facilitate communication or to make something known. For example, a radio
(when operated according to its designed uses) produces sound. The radio is
a physical object, with the emanating sound, its EMMI. The ontology that
