The desire to develop a holistic framework for knowing and modelling in human enterprises is not new. Methodologies, such as Systems Dynamics, Soft Systems and the Viable Systems Model all claim a holistic perspective. Each of these approaches emphasises the interrelatedness of `things', rather than the `things' themselves. Thus, they avoid the possible fragmentation that can occur when elements within a situation are treated as if they exist independently. Unfortunately, the systems approaches flounder because they fail to reconcile knowledge with the path that brings it into being, or to satisfactorily deal with the concepts of order or communication in language. The Thesis, therefore, provides a greater clarification of these issues, in the light of enactive cognitive science, chaos theory and contemporary theories on dialogue. As a result, a new framework is presented, for knowing and modelling in human enterprises, that is based on our `new' understanding of holism. The organisational context of the Thesis is provided by two generic models, both developed by the author (a model of Duopoly Competition and a model of Chaos Control ), together with a case study of the Danish hearing aid manufacturer Oticon. The Thesis concludes by presenting various insights arising from our new frame of reference and reflecting on their challenges for organisations.

No description available.

The non-local stabilization of nonlinear systems by output feedback is a challenging problem that remains the subject of continuing investigation in control theory. In this thesis we develop two globally asymptotically stabilizing output feedback algorithms for multivariable nonlinear systems. Our first result is an extension a well-known output feedback method to a class of nonlinear systems whose dynamics can be written as a collection of subsystems that are dynamically coupled through output-dependent nonlinear terms. We show that this method must be modified to accommodate the dynamic coupling by introducing additional nonlinear damping terms into each control input. Our second contribution involves the application of observer backstepping to systems in a restricted block-triangular observer form. In this form, the nonlinearities entering each subsystem are allowed to depend on the output associated with the subsystem, and all upper subsystem states, including unmeasured ones. The proposed algorithm is demonstrated on a magnetically levitated ball. / Controls

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Rutgers University, 2007. / "Graduate Program in Industrial and Systems Engineering." Includes bibliographical references (p. 181-186).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Murdoch University, 2006. / Thesis submitted to the Division of Arts. Includes bibliographical references.

Kath. Univ., Diss. von Ivan Markovsky--Leuven. / Literaturverz. S. 197 - 202.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2004. / Supervisor: Raul G. Longoria. Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M. S.)--Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009. / Committee Chair: Sadegh, Nader; Committee Member: Chen, Xu-Yan; Committee Member: Chen, Ye-Hwa. Part of the SMARTech Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Collection.

Thesis (M.A.)--Brigham Young University. Dept. of Communications, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 109-120).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2004. / Supervisor: Philip J. Morrison. Vita. Includes bibliographical references.