executive summary of the three research papers: (1) Holism vs. Reductionism, (2) SDLC Models and (3) Data Backup/Disaster Planning.

Table of Contents Introduction 3 Holism 3 Holism in information systems and IT 4 Reductionism 6 Reductionism in information systems and IT 6 Holism vs Reductionism 7 Conclusion 8 References 9

A system is a collection of two or more independent or interacting components that form some complex entity. A system has some boundaries including temporal and special boundaries. The boundaries are influenced by the environment of the system and surround the system. The boundaries create the structure and form of the system. A system must have some functionalities and properties (Hill, 2001). Two or more systems when gets connected to one another and interact, then those become the subsystems of a larger system.

System thinking is also called holism. Holism is a process of considering a system as a whole entity or element. It studies the properties of the whole entity called system and does not bother about the properties and individual characteristics of the subsystems. Reductionism is the antithesis of holism (Frodeman, 2010). Reductionism studies exclusively the properties of subsystems rather than the whole system. In reductionism, the whole system is described as the sum of the subsystems.

Holism is a philosophical idea or concept that opposes the concept of atomism. Holism considers a whole system as a primary one that is more than the ‘sum’ of the subsystems. Holism depends on the concepts of aggregation to study and explore the properties and characteristics of complex systems (Hill, 2001). Holism is used extensively in philosophy, social science, economy, medicine and various disciplines of science including the study of information systems.

System thinking is an interdisciplinary concept that has been adopted from the mid and late of the twentieth century. Development in fields like information theory, decision theory, game theory, automation and system engineering, management theory, operation research, and cybernetics have brought the concept and its applications in modern information and communication system design and development (Pellegrini, Cerrai, Freguglia, Benci, & Israel, 2013). In one way, the reasons behind the adoption of the concept of system thinking or holism include the following,

· System thinking helps to understand the ‘big picture’ rather than the specializations of the subsystems.

· System thinking helps to create an abstraction and that in turns help to develop the systems by wrapping the complexities of the system at different layers or levels.

Artificial intelligence is an example of how system thinking or holism can be applied to the study of complex information systems and IT. AI is an interdisciplinary field that covers subjects like mathematics, programming, machine learning, natural language processing, robotics, automation, electronics and various other domains. Margaret Boden has distinguished six forms of different types of interdisciplinary (Frodeman, 2010), such as,

1. Encyclopedic

2. Contextualizing

3. Sharing

4. Generalizing

5. Integrative

6. Co-operative

According to Boden, artificial intelligence or AI is an important example of integrated interdisciplinary. The core areas of AI, traditional AI, symbolic AI, connectionism and Nouvelle AI, individually have collected concepts from other disciplines like logic, philosophy, psychology, neurophysiology and so on. However, when complex systems of AI are studied then it focuses on the system rather than the interdisciplinary that are lending the concepts behind the system or the interconnected subsystems (Pellegrini, Cerrai, Freguglia, Benci, & Israel, 2013). The development of a complex information system from the interconnections and interactions of its subsystems also supports the notion of the ‘creative evolution' of Smuts who gave the definition of holism. When a complex AI system is built, then the properties and functionalities of the system are developed through this ‘creative evolution' and are not limited to the functionalities and properties of the subsystems (Frodeman, 2010). So, it supports the claim of holism that a system is not a mere ‘sum’ of its subsystems.

Figure 1: Illustration for Reductionism and Holism, [Source:www.slideshare.net]

Reductionism supports the concept of atomism. A number of contentious and related theories of reductionism focuses on the nature of the complex systems by ‘reducing’ it more fundamental and simpler properties, explanations, phenomena and so on (Pellegrini, Cerrai, Freguglia, Benci, & Israel, 2013). Reductionism is basically a concept based on the logical consequences of philosophical materialism. Reductionism or atomism is used in philosophy and science, especially in physics, environmental studies, arts and many other. In information systems and computation also reductionism has widespread application and uses.

Reducing an object may reduce the complexity of the problem or the system on which the focus is being given. However, it may overlook the characteristics evolved from the interconnectedness of the objects in the system. Hence, it is difficult to cover all aspects of a system using the concepts of reductionism (Primas, 2013).

While development of a complex information system, the system development approaches like agile methodologies work on the concepts of reductionism. Rather than trying to develop the whole system at a time, it focuses on the fundamental building blocks or the subsystems. It gradually develops the subsystems and builds up the whole system gradually from the subsystems (Appelo, 2010).

Reductionism is mainly focused on reducing the complexity of a system while studying it. This fundamental idea of reductionism is followed during the system development process. an iterative and incremental approach is taken to develop the complete system through the development of the smaller subsystems (Appelo, 2010).

Reductionism also supports the concepts of reusability. Reusability is a primary feature in object-oriented domain. A subsystem is reused while development of one or more separate systems as the properties and characteristics of the subsystem are retained at the atomic level (Appelo, 2010).

An example can be a complex system that has a search functionality. While development of the system, the search functionality will be developed as an individual module that will be connected to the database module and will do the search operation only. This same module can be reused when connected to another dataset. Also, the functionality of the module is defining one function of the main system. Hence, it supports the concept of reductionism. The functionalities of the main system are boiled down to the functions of the modules in the system. So, the system can be thought as a ‘sum’ of the modules of the system.

Holism and reductionism, both are critical concepts in philosophy and science. Primarily, from the ancient times, philosophers and scientists were more interested in the concept of holism as it was supported by various environmental and philosophical concepts and systems. Later on, atomism and reductionism were introduced. However, holism still goes beyond the applicability of reductionism. There are various reasons behind that, like,

· A system has various parts that are interconnected. A system may have some unique characteristics that are not defined by any of these subsystems and may have stemmed from the ‘critical evolution' of the interconnectedness. Holism can cover those unique characteristics of the system as it sees the system as a whole (Frodeman, 2010). On the contrary, reductionism will fail to describe it as it will cover only the characteristics of the parts of the system rather than the whole system.

· Holism helps to focus on the big picture and helps to understand the system from different aspects and perspectives. However, reductionism goes into deep and focuses on only to a part of the system, hence, it misses the ‘big picture’ (Primas, 2013).

· By nature, systems have interconnected parts and complexity. Holism helps to make necessary alteration in the interconnected parts by keeping the whole system stable to the changes. It adds some level of tolerance of the system and makes it stable. Such alteration is not possible in reductionism (Appelo, 2010). Because such alteration may create changes in the structure and characteristics of the whole system and that will not be covered by the idea of holism. On the contrary, holism can describe such additional features and changes in the structure and properties of the whole system.

Holism wins the edge over reductionism for various reasons. In the paper, holism and reductionism in system thinking have been discussed from various angles and using a various example from the information systems and IT domains. The paper will help to understand the concepts behind holism and reductionism as well as an application so these concepts in real-world examples.

References Appelo, J. (2010). Management 3.0. New York: Pearson . Frodeman, R. (2010). The Oxford Handbook of Interdisciplinarity. New York: Oxford University Press. Hill, G. (2001). A Level Psychology Through Diagrams. New York: Oxford University Press. Pellegrini, C., Cerrai, P., Freguglia, P., Benci, V., & Israel, G. (2013). Determinism, Holism, and Complexity. New York: Springer. Primas, H. (2013). Chemistry, Quantum Mechanics and Reductionism. New York: Springer .