system (sistem)

[Formerly also systeme; = F. système = Sp. sistema = Pg. system a = It. sis tema = D. systeem = G. Sw. Dan. system, Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, A hero perish or a sparrow fall, Atoms or systems into ruin hurled, And now a bubble burst, and now a world. Pope, E ay on Man, i. 89. Every work, both of nature and art, is a system ; and, as every particular thing, both natural and artificial, is for some use or purpose out of and beyond itself, one may add to what has already been brought into the idea of a system its conducivene to this one or more ends. Let us instance in a watch. Butler, Analogy. A Natural System is one which attempts to make all the divisions natural, the widest as well as the narrowest, and therefore applies no characters peremptorily.. An Artificial System is one in which the smaller groups (the Genera) are natural, and in which the wider divisions (Cla es, Orders) are constructed by the peremptory application of selected Characters (selected, however, so as not to break up the smaller groups). Whewell , Philos. of Inductive Sciences, I. p. xxxii. For a system , in the most proper and philosophic sense of the word, is a complete and absolute whole. H. Bushnell , Nature and the Supernatural, ii. Star and system rolling past. Tennyson, In Memoriam, Conclusion. 2. A plan or scheme according to which ideas or things are connected into a whole; a regular union of principles or facts forming one entire whole; an a emblage of facts, or of principles and conclusions, scientifically arranged, or disposed according to certain mutual relations so as to form a complete whole; a connected view of all the truths or principles of some department of knowledge or action: as, a system of philosophy; a system of government; a system of education; a system of divinity; a system of botany or of chemistry; a system of railroading: often equivalent to method. There ought to be a system of manners in every nation which a well-formed mind would be disposed to relish. Burke, Rev. in France. In the modern system of war, nations the most wealthy are obliged to have recourse to large loans. A. Hamilton , The Federalist, No. 30. There was no part of the whole system of Government with which they [the Houses of Parliament] had not power to interfere by advice equivalent to command. Macaulay , Sir William Temple. I am deeply convinced that among us all systems , whether religious or political, which rest on a principle of absolutism, must of nece ity be, not indeed tyrannical, but feeble and ineffective systems . Gladstone, Might of Right, p. 102. 3. The scheme of all created things considered as one whole; the universe.-4. Regular method or order; plan: as, to have no system in one's busine or study.-5. In astron., any hypothesis or theory of the disposition and arrangements of the heavenly bodies by which their phenomena, their motions, changes, etc., are explained: as, the Ptolemaic system; the Copernican system; a system of the universe, or of the world. - 6. In the fine arts, a collection of the rules and principles upon which an artist works.-7. ( a ) In Byzantine music, an interval conceived of as compounded of two le er in system tervals, as an octave or a tetrachord. (b) In medieval and modern music, a series of tones arranged and cla ified for artistic use, like a mode or scale. (c) In modern musical notation, two or more staffs braced together for concerted music.-8. In anc. pros., a group of two or more periods; by extension, a single period of more than two or three cola; a hyper me tron. A system the metrical form of which is repeated once or oftener in the course of a poem is called a strophe. 9. In biol.: ( a ) An a emblage of parts or organs of the same or similar ti ues. The principal systems of the body in this sense are the nervous, both cerebrospinal and sympathetic; the muscular, both voluntary and involuntary; the o eous, including the cartilages as well as the bones of the skeleton; the vascu lar, including the blood - vascular and lymphatic or absorbent; the tegumentary; the mucous, including the mucous membranes; and the serous, including the serous membranes. These systems may be subdivided, as the vascular into the blood-vascular and lymphatic systems; or some of them may be grouped together, as when the connective- ti ue system includes the bones, cartilages, ligaments, tendons, and general areolar or cellular ti ues of the body. Hence- (b) In a wider sense, a concurrence of parts or organs in some function. Most if not all such systems act physiologically by the concurrence of several other le er systems: as, the digestive system; the respiratory system; the reproductive system. Hence-(c) In the widest sense, the entire body as a physiological unity or anatomical whole: as, to take food into the system; to have one's system out of order. (d) In as cid i ology, the cœnobium of those compound tunicates which have a common cloaca, as the Botryllida. Von Drasche, 1883.-10. One of the larger divisions of the geological series: as, the Devonian system; the Silurian system. The term is used by various geologists with quite different meanings, mostly, however, as the equivalent of series: thus, Cretaceous system (the Cretaceous series). 11. In nat. hist.: (a) In the abstract, cla ification; any method of arranging, disposing, or setting forth animals and plants, or any series of these, in orderly sequence, as by cla es, orders. families, genera, etc., with due coördination and relative subordination of the several groups; also, the principles of such cla ification; taxonomy: as, the morphological system; a physiological system. There is but one adequate and natural system, namely, that which cla ifies animals and plants by structure alone, according to their degrees of genetic relationship, upon consideration of descent with modification in the course of evolutionary proce es; it is the aim of every systematist to discover this true taxonomy and set it forth by cla ificatory methods. (b) In the concrete, any zoölogical or botanical cla ification; any actual arrangement which is devised for the purpose of cla ifying and naming objects of natural history; a formal scheme, schedule, or inventory of such objects, or a systematic treatise upon them: as, the Linnean or artificial system of plants; Cuvier's system of cla ification; the quinarian system. Such systems are very numerous, and no two agree in every detail either of cla ification or of nomenclature; but all have in view the same end, which is sought to be attained by similar methods, and upon certain principles to which most naturalists now a ent. - Abkari system. See ab kari.-Action of a moving system. See action.-Adjunct system, a system of linear equations whose coeffi cients are the corresponding minors of the determinant of a primitive system. - Allotment, American, asymmetric system. See the qualifying words. - Ambulacral system. Same as water -vascular system. - Apolar system, the aggregate of surfaces of a given order whose with to a given surface are indetermi nate.- Banting system. See bantingism. - Barrier, block, blood-vascular, bothy system. See the quali fying words.-Binary system. See binary cla ification, under binary. Brunonian system, an old medical doctrine formulated by Dr. John Brown, a Scottish physician. It was based on the a umption that the body po e es a peculiar property of excitability, and that every agent capable of acting on the body during life does so as a stimulant. When these stimuli were normal in amount, the condition was one of health; if exce ive, causing debility; if insufficient, causing indirect debility. Canonical system, a system of differential equations of the forms 4 dxi = dt, dpi = dt, i = (1, 2, 3,...四入 дрі dai Cellular, cibarian, circular system. See the adjec tives.- Centimeter-gram-second system. See cent i meter. Circulatory system, the organs collectively which aid in the circulation of the blood and lymph; the vascular system. - Complete system of differential equations, a system such that all the equations dedu cible it are linear combinations of the equations of the system. Conjugate system, a system of curvilinear coördinates such that the two families of curves for which one or the other coördinate is constant have for their tangents at each point of the surface to which the courd in ates relate conjugate diameters of the Dupinian indicatrix. Conjunct, conservative, continental, convict, Copernican, cost-book system. See the qualifying words. - Cottier system. See cotter1.- Cumulative system of voting. See cumulative. - Cyclic system, an orthogonal system of which one family consists of cir cles, or has circular trajectories. Decimal system. See decimal. - Dentinal system, all the tubules radiating system from a single pulp-cavity. - Desmic system, a system of three tetrahedra which are members of a pencil of quartic surfaces. - Desmoid system, Bichat's term for the skin and its derivative-Dioptric system. See dioptric. - Di ipative system. See di ipative. - Elementary system, a system of surfaces which satisfies an elementary condition - namely, that every surface shall pa through certain points or touch certain straight lines or planes. - Enneadic, epidermal, excitomotor, feudal system. See the adjectives. - Equivalent system, one of two or more systems of algebraic forms such that the totality of functional invariants of each system is the same as that of any other. - Fabric i an system of cla ification. Same as cibarian system. - Field-gra system. See open - field system, under field. - Gastrovascular, gob-road, hexagonal system. See the qualifying words. Gauche system, a system of quantities aij (i = 1, 2,...n; j = 1,2,...n) such that aij = -aji in every case, except when i = j. - Halphenian system, a system of curves defined by conditions not independent, so that certain modifications of the characteristics are 6143 tematic arrangement of plants or animals; a systematic course of study. Every nation, consequently, whose affairs betray a want of wisdom and stability may calculate on every lo which can be sustained from the more systematic policy of its wiser neighbours. A. Hamilton , Federalist, No. 62. One by one exceptions vanish, and all becomes syste matic . H. Spencer , Social Statics, p. 322. The whole course of divinity is best divided into four departments: Exegetical Theology, Historical Theology, Systematic Theology, and Practical Theology. Schaff , Christ and Christianity, p. 2. What I hope to have shown is that two systems of logic are not made the same system by the fact that both are systematic methods of procedure, nor yet by the fact that both expre the common part and the aggregate of two terms in the same way. C. L. Franklin , in Amer. Jour. Psychol., II. 566. 2. Proceeding according to system or regular method; with intention; formal: as, a syste tématiser = Sp. sistematizar = It. sistematizzare; as Gr. σύστημα(τ-), a system, + -ize.] To reduce to system or method; methodize; arrange in, or in accordance with, a system; construct a system, as of cla ification in natural history. Also spelled systematise. "It appears to me," said the daguerreotypist, smiling, "that Uncle Venner has the principles of Fourier at the bottom of his wisdom; only they have not quite so much distinctne in his mind as in that of the systematizing Hawthorne, Seven Gables, x. French man." There has not been an effort to systematize the scattered labors of isolated thinkers. G. H. Lewes, Probs. of Life and Mind, I. i. § 76. In Haeckel's "Generelle Morpho logie" there is all the force, suggestivene , and what I may term the system a tizing power of Oken, without his extravagance. Huxley , Critiques and Addre es, p. 270. system. See the qualifying words. - Interlocking system of signals. See interlock. - Iridochoroidal system, Cadiat's name for the choroid and iris taken together as being of similar structure and development. Isothermal system of curvilinear coördinates, such a system that, u and v being the coördinates, and ds an element of the arc of any curve on the surface, ds2 = A (du3 + dv2).-Isotonic system. See isotonic. Jacob i an system of differential equations. See Jacob i an2. matic writer. A systematic political opposition, vehement, daring, and inflexible, sprang from a schism about trifles, altogether unconnected with the real interests of religion or of the state. Macaulay, Hallam's Const. Hist. 3. Of or pertaining to the system of the universe; cosmical.-4. Cla ificatory; taxonomic; marked by, based on, or agreeable with any complicated of or cure, which pa ive are within active and patinations combicles, nerves, and other ti ues. - Linnean system. See Linnean.-Logier i an system, in music, a system of instruction upon the pianoforte invented by J. B. Logier, and patented in England in 1814. It involved two things the use of the chiro plast, a mechanical contrivance for holding the pupil's hands in a correct position at the keyboard, and the simultaneous instruction of several pupils at as many pianofortes. The chiro plast had drawbacks which have led to its being discarded, but the plan of cla instruction is in use to some extent in all music schools. Lot, Macleayan, male, mark, mercantile, meta morphotic, metayer, military, moiety, muscular, natural, nervous, octave system. See the qualifying words.- Open-field system. See field. - Parish, pavilion, portal, Ptolemaic, purchase, Pythagorean system. See the qualifying words. - Quinary system. See quinarian. - Refracting system. Same as dioptric system. Reservation, saliferous, sexual, sidereal, silent, solar, spur system. See the qualifying words. Spoils system. See spoil. - Stomatogastric nervous system, sympathetic nervous system. See stoma to gastric, sympathetic. Sub-Him a lay an, sweating, etc., system. See the qualifying words. - System-disease of the cerebrospinal axis, a disease affecting a tract of nerve fibers or nerve-cells having throughout common anatomical relations and physiological properties. - System of conjugate substitutions. See substitution.-System of surfaces. See surface. - Systems of crystal liz a tion, See crystallography, hexagonal, isometric, monoclinic, orthorhombic, tetragonal, triclinic.-Systems of fortification. See fortification. - Taconic system (so called from the Taconic Mountains, a branch or continuation of the Green Mountains in southern Vermont, western Ma achusetts, and eastern New York); in geol., rocks of Lower Silurian age (or Cam brian, in part, according to the nomenclature of the United States Geological Sur vey now adopted), more or le metamorphosed, former lys supposed by some geologists to constitute a distinct It is thus finally made positive that the Taconic system is not a pre-Silurian system, and that the claiming equivalency with the Huronian was but a leap in the dark. It is manifest, in fact, that "Tacqnic system" is only a synonym of the older term "Lower Silurian," as this term was used by geologists generally twenty, thirty, and forty years since, and by many writers till a much later date. J. D. Dana , Amer. Jour. Sci., Dec., 1888, p. 411. Tail-rope, tarsal, territorial, tetragonal, etc., system. See the qualifying words. - Three-field system, See field. - Vascular system, the circulatory system. Water-vascular system. See water-vascular. Syn. 1-4. System, Method. Strictly, " System is logical or scientific collocation. Method is logical or scientific procedure" (C. J. Smith, Synonyms Discriminated). But system is often used for method; method is not used for system. System, Range, Chain, in orography, as used by physical geographers writing in English, are nearly the same: thus, we find the "Appal a chi an chain" frequently called "Appal a chi an range" or "ranges," and also "Appal a chi an system." System is the more comprehensive term. All the ranges which go to make up a complex of mountains sufficiently nearly a unit, as popularly designated, to be embraced under one name, may be called a system: thus, the ranges of the Great Basin, some twenty or more in number, may properly all be cla ed together as forming the Great Basin "mountain system," or simply "system." As thus defined, the Appal a chi an Region, System , or complex of ranges , extends from the promontory of Gaspé, in a mean direction of northeast and southwest, to Alabama-a distance of about 1,300 miles-where it disappears becoming covered by the much more recent geological formations, which form a broad belt along the Gulf of Mexico, and extend far up the Mi i ippi Valley. J. D. Whitney, The United States, p. 32. systematic (sis-te-mat'ik), a. [= F. systéma tique = Sp. sistemático = Pg. systematico = It. sistematico , systematic us , συστηματι κός , combined in one whole, systematic, system .] 1. Of or pertaining to system; consisting in system; methodical; formed with regular connection and adaptation or subordination of parts to one another and to the design of the whole: as, a sys a systematic treatise; systematic principles or practice; systematic zoology or botany. See system, 11.-5. In anc. pros., of or pertaining to a system, or group of pe periods; constituting systems, or composed of systems. Systematic com position is the form of composition found in poems or choric pa ages consisting of systems or strophes, as opposed to stichic or linear composition. - Systematic anatomy, the anatomy of the various systems of organs and parts of the body: used with reference to macroscopic surgical and topographical anatomy. - Systematic botany. See botany and system, 11.- Systematic logic. Same as objective logic (a) (which see, under logic ). Systematic theology. See theology. - Systematic zoölogy. See system, 11, and zoology. =Syn. See orderly. systematical (sis-te-mat'i-kal), a. [ Nor has the systematical way of writing been prejudicial only to the proficiency of some readers, but also to the reputation of some writers of systematical books. Boyle , Works, I. 300. systematically (sis-te-mat'i-kal-i), adv. In a systematic manner; in the form of a system; methodically; with system, or deliberate method. systematician (sistem-a-tish'an), n. [ In the former capacity he is, as Zola aptly remarks, a "thought mathematician," systematician , a slave to the consistent application of his own theories. Nineteenth Century , XX. 73.