Models, Meta-Models, Multi-Models, Mega-Models

You already know that the result of modeling is the creation of models, which can exist on various physical media. A model helps us make judgments about the object being modeled. The object being modeled is the system of interest, as well as other types of systems. Models exist for the supersystem, creation systems, surrounding systems, or subsystems.

Let us emphasize once again that models are created using a specific method of description. This method specifies what is most important in the object being modeled and what needs to be considered in the models. This “most important” aspect for a particular model is called the meta-model.

For example, consider the system—the city of Moscow. Then there is a map of the city. The map is a model of the city of Moscow. The map’s legend is the meta-model. The map contains only a tiny fraction of information about the city, but it is the most important information that someone decided to include. One map might show the city’s districts, another might show roads and industrial facilities, and a third might show water protection zones, and so on.

The legend of each map indicates what is important in those areas and what needs to be displayed in these particular models. You will see a road on the map because it is important, but you will not see its width, since that was not important to the person who created that specific map.

A collection of interconnected models, created using different methods of description, is usually called a multi-model. This is like a collection of various maps for the same territory: flora, fauna, population density, terrain, road networks, and so on.

In addition to the set of maps, we also need a set of legends for these maps. A multi-model, together with its defining meta-models, is called a mega-model.

You can read more about models, meta-models, multi-models, and mega-models in the textbook “Systems Thinking.” This is useful for broadening your perspective. After that, it is necessary to apply these concepts in project activities.

It is best to identify (and correct) mistakes in the system model during the description and documentation of the system—that is, before it is built, not afterward, and certainly not during the system’s operation. As the saying goes: describe seven times, build once!