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For the various types of hierarchy, see hierarchy (disambiguation)

A hierarchy is an arrangement of objects, people, elements, values, grades, orders, classes, etc. , in a ranked or graduated series. A ranking is a relationship between a set of items such that for any two items the first is either "ranked higher than" "ranked lower than" or "ranked equal Graduation is the action of receiving or conferring an Academic degree or the associated ceremony The word derives from the Greek ἱεραρχία (hierarchia), from ἱεράρχης (hierarches), "president of sacred rites, high-priest" and that from ἱερός (hieros), "sacred" + ἄρχω (arkho), "to lead, to rule"[1][2]. Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly The word can also refer to a series of such items so arranged. Items in a hierarchy are typically thought of as being "above," "below," or "at the same level as" one another. [3][4]

The first use of the word "hierarchy" cited by the Oxford English Dictionary was in 1880, when it was used in reference to the three orders of three angels as depicted by Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite. The Oxford English Dictionary ( OED) published by the Oxford University Press (OUP is a comprehensive Dictionary of the English Year 1880 ( MDCCCLXXX) was a Leap year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Leap year Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, also known as Pseudo-Denys, is the anonymous theologian and philosopher of the late 5th to early 6th century whose Corpus Areopagiticum Pseudo-Dionysius used the word both in reference to the celestial hierarchy and the ecclesiastical hierarchy. [5] His term is derived from the Greek for 'Bishop' (hierarch), and Dionysius is credited with first use of it as an abstract noun. Since hierarchical churches, such as the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches, had tables of organization that were "hierarchical" in the modern sense of the word (traditionally with God as the pinnacle of the hierarchy), the term came to refer to similar organizational methods in more general settings. The Eastern Orthodox Church is the second largest single Christian Communion in the world God is the principal or sole Deity in Religions and other belief systems that worship one deity.

A hierarchy can link entities either directly or indirectly, and either vertically or horizontally. The only direct links in a hierarchy, insofar as they are hierarchical, are to one's immediate superior or to one of one's subordinates, although a system that is largely hierarchical can also incorporate other organizational patterns. Indirect hierarchical links can extend "vertically" upwards or downwards via multiple links in the same direction. All parts of the hierarchy which are not vertically linked to one another can nevertheless be "horizontally" linked by traveling up the hierarchy to find a common direct or indirect superior, and then down again. This is akin to two co-workers, neither of whom is the other's boss, but both of whose chains of command will eventually meet.

These relationships can be formalized mathematically; see hierarchy (mathematics). In Mathematics, a hierarchy is a Preorder, ie an ordered set The term is used to stress a natural Hierarchical relation among the elements

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Computation and electronics

Large electronic devices such as computers are usually composed of modules, which are themselves created out of smaller components (integrated circuits), which in turn are internally organized using hierarchical methods (e. Electronics refers to the flow of charge (moving Electrons through Nonmetal conductors (mainly Semiconductors, whereas electrical A computer is a Machine that manipulates data according to a list of instructions. Microchipsjpg|right|thumb|200px|Microchips ( EPROM memory with a transparent window showing the integrated circuit inside g. using standard cells). The order of tasks in a computational algorithm is often managed hierarchically, with repeated loops nested within one another. In Mathematics, Computing, Linguistics and related subjects an algorithm is a sequence of finite instructions often used for Calculation Computer files in a file system are stored in an hierarchy of directories in most operating systems. A computer file is a block of Arbitrary Information, or resource for storing information which is available to a Computer program and is usually In Computing, a file system (often also written as filesystem) is a method for storing and organizing Computer files and the data they contain to make In Computing, a directory, catalog, folder or drawer is an entity in a File system, which contains a group of files and/or other directories An operating system (commonly abbreviated OS and O/S) is the software component of a Computer system that is responsible for the management and coordination In object-oriented programming, classes are organized hierarchically; the relationship between two related classes is called inheritance. Object-oriented programming (OOP is a Programming paradigm that uses " objects " and their interactions to design applications and computer programs In Object-oriented programming, inheritance is a way to form new classes (instances of which are called objects using classes that have already been defined In the Internet, IP addresses are increasingly organized in an hierarchy (so that the routing will continue to function as the Internet grows). The Internet is a global system of interconnected Computer networks An Internet Protocol ( IP) address is a numerical identification ( Logical address) that is assigned to devices participating in a Computer network Classless Inter-Domain Routing ( CIDR, pronounced "cider" is a method of categorizing Internet Protocol (IP addresses for the purpose of allocating Routing is the process of selecting paths in a network along which to send network traffic

Computer graphic imaging (CGI)

Within most CGI and computer animation programs is the use of hierarchies. Computer animation Computer-generated imagery (also known as CGI) is the application of the field of Computer graphics or more specifically 3D computer graphics Computer-generated imagery Computer animation is the art of creating moving images with the use of Computers It is a subfield of Computer graphics Computer programs (also software programs, or just programs) are instructions for a Computer. On a 3D model of a human, the chest is a parent of the upper left arm, which is a parent of the lower left arm, which is a parent of the hand. 3D computer graphics (in contrast to 2D computer graphics) are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data that is stored in the computer The Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL was a rebel group in Liberia that became active in March 2003, launching attacks from Côte d'Ivoire. Human beings, humans or man (Origin 1590–1600 L homō man OL hemō the earthly one (see Humus The chest is a part of the Anatomy of humans and various other animals sometimes referred to as the Thorax. A parent is a Father or Mother; one who sires or gives A parent is a Father or Mother; one who sires or gives A parent is a Father or Mother; one who sires or gives The hands ( med / lat: manus pl manūs are the two intricate prehensile multi- Fingered body parts normally located at the end of each arm of a This is used in modeling and animation of almost everything built as a 3D digital model. The Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL was a rebel group in Liberia that became active in March 2003, launching attacks from Côte d'Ivoire. The bouncing ball animation (below consists of these 6 frames A digital system uses discrete (discontinuous values usually but not always Symbolized Numerically (hence called "digital" to represent information for The Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL was a rebel group in Liberia that became active in March 2003, launching attacks from Côte d'Ivoire.

Biological taxonomy

In biology, the study of taxonomy is one of the most conventionally hierarchical kinds of knowledge, placing all living beings in a nested structure of divisions related to their probable evolutionary descent. Foundations of modern biology There are five unifying principles Taxonomy is the practice and science of classification The word comes from the Greek, taxis (meaning 'order' 'arrangement' and, nomos Most evolutionary biologists assert a hierarchy extending from the level of the specimen (an individual living organism — say, a single newt), to the species of which it is a member (perhaps the Eastern Newt), outward to further successive levels of genus, family, order, class, phylum, and kingdom. The eastern newt ( Notophthalmus viridescens) is a common Salamander of eastern North America. A genus (plural genera from Γένος Latin genus "descent family type gender" is a low-level Taxonomic (A newt is a kind of salamander (family), and all salamanders are types of amphibians (class), which are all types of vertebrates (phylum). ) Essential to this kind of reasoning is the proof that members of a division on one level are more closely related to one another than to members of a different division on the same level; they must also share ancestry in the level above. Thus, the system is hierarchical because it forbids the possibility of overlapping categories. For example, it will not permit a 'family' of beings containing some examples that are amphibians and others that are reptiles — divisions on any level do not straddle the categories of structure that are hierarchically above it. (Such straddling would be an example of heterarchy. A heterarchy is a system of organization replete with overlap multiplicity mixed ascendancy and/or divergent-but-coexistent patterns of relation )

Organisms are also commonly described as assemblies of parts (organs) which are themselves assemblies of yet smaller parts. When we observe that the relationship of cell to organ is like that of the relationship of organ to body, we are invoking the hierarchical aspects of physiology. (The term "organic" is often used to describe a sense of the small imitating the large, which suggests hierarchy, but isn't necessarily hierarchical. ) The analogy of organ to body also extends to the relationship of a living being as a system that might resemble an ecosystem consisting of several living beings; physiology is thus hierarchically nested in ecology. An ecosystem is a natural unit consisting of all plants animals and micro-organisms( Biotic factors in an area functioning together with all of the non-living physical ( Ecology (from Greek grc οἶκος oikos, "house(hold" and grc -λογία -logia) is the scientific study of

Physics

In physics, the standard model of reasoning on the nature of the physical world decomposes large bodies down to their smallest particle components. Physics (Greek Physis - φύσις in everyday terms is the Science of Matter and its motion. The Standard Model of Particle physics is a theory that describes three of the four known Fundamental interactions together with the Elementary particles In Particle physics, an elementary particle or fundamental particle is a particle not known to have substructure that is it is not known to be made Observations on the subatomic (particle) level are often seen as fundamental constituent axioms, on which conclusions about the atomic and molecular levels depend. The relationships of energy and gravity between celestial bodies are, in turn, dependent upon the atomic and molecular properties of smaller bodies. In energetics, energy quality is sometimes used to quantify energy hierarchy. Energetics is the scientific study of energy flows and storages under transformation Energy quality the contrast between different forms of energy, the different Trophic levels in ecological systems and the propensity of energy to convert

Language and semiotics

In linguistics, especially in the work of Noam Chomsky, and of later generative linguistics theories, such as Ray Jackendoff's, words or sentences are often broken down into hierarchies of parts and wholes. Linguistics is the scientific study of Language, encompassing a number of sub-fields Avram Noam Chomsky (noʊm ˈtʃɑmski born December 7 1928 is an American linguist, Philosopher, cognitive scientist, Political Generative linguistics is a school of thought within Linguistics that makes use of the concept of a Generative grammar. Ray Jackendoff (born January 23, 1945) is an American Linguist. Hierarchical reasoning about the underlying structure of language expressions leads some linguists to the hypothesis that the world's languages are bound together in a broad array of variants subordinate to a single Universal Grammar. Universal grammar is a theory of Linguistics postulating principles of Grammar shared by all languages thought to be innate to humans ( linguistic nativism

Music

In music, the structure of a composition is often understood hierarchically (for example by Heinrich Schenker (1868–1935, see Schenkerian analysis), and in the (1985) Generative Theory of Tonal Music, by composer Fred Lerdahl and linguist Ray Jackendoff). Music is an Art form in which the medium is Sound organized in Time. Heinrich Schenker ( June 19, 1868 - January 13, 1935) was a Music theorist best known for his approach to Musical analysis Schenkerian analysis is a method of Musical analysis of tonal music based on the theories of Heinrich Schenker. Fred Lerdahl (born March 10 1943) is the Fritz Reiner Professor of Musical Composition at Columbia University Ray Jackendoff (born January 23, 1945) is an American Linguist. The sum of all notes in a piece is understood to be an all-inclusive surface, which can be reduced to successively more sparse and more fundamental types of motion. The levels of structure that operate in Schenker's theory are the foreground, which is seen in all the details of the musical score; the middle ground, which is roughly a summary of an essential contrapuntal progression and voice-leading; and the background or Ursatz, which is one of only a few basic "long-range counterpoint" structures that are shared in the gamut of tonal music literature. In Schenkerian analysis, the fundamental structure ( German: Ursatz) is a specific musical pattern that occurs at the most remote (or " background

The pitches and form of tonal music are organized hierarchically, all pitches deriving their importance from their relationship to a tonic key, and secondary themes in other keys are brought back to the tonic in a recapitulation of the primary theme. Pitch represents the perceived Fundamental frequency of a sound The term musical form refers to two related concepts the type of composition (for example a musical work can have the form of a Symphony, a Tonality is a system of Music in which specific hierarchical pitch relationships are based on a key "center" or tonic. Music is an Art form in which the medium is Sound organized in Time. The tonic is the first note of a musical scale in the tonal method of Musical composition. In Musical notation, a key signature is a series of sharp or flat symbols placed on the staff, designating notes that are to be consistently Susan McClary connects this specifically in the sonata-allegro form to the feminist hierarchy of gender (see above) in her book Feminine Endings, even pointing out that primary themes were often previously called "masculine" and secondary themes "feminine. Susan McClary (born 2 October 1946) is a Musicologist considered to be a significant figure in the " New Musicology " Sonata form is a Musical form that has been used widely since the early Classical period. "

Ethics, behavioral psychology, philosophies of identity

In ethics, various virtues are enumerated and sometimes organized hierarchically according to certain brands of virtue theory. Ethics is a major branch of Philosophy, encompassing right conduct and good life Virtue ( Latin virtus; Greek) is moral Excellence. Personal virtues are characteristics valued as promoting individual Virtue theory is a branch of Moral philosophy that emphasizes character rather than rules or consequences as the key element of ethical thinking

In all of these examples, there is an asymmetry of 'compositional' significance between levels of structure, so that small parts of the whole hierarchical array depend, for their meaning, on their membership in larger parts.

In the work of diverse theorists such as William James (1842–1910), Michel Foucault (1926–1984) and Hayden White, important critiques of hierarchical epistemology are advanced. For other people named William James see William James (disambiguation William James (January 11 1842 – August 26 1910 was a pioneering Michel Foucault ( (15 October 1926 – 25 June 1984 was a French philosopher, Historian, Intellectual, Critic and Sociologist. Hayden White (born 1928 is an Historian in the tradition of Literary criticism, perhaps most famous for his work Metahistory The Historical Imagination Epistemology (from Greek επιστήμη - episteme, "knowledge" + λόγος, " Logos " or theory of knowledge James famously asserts in his work "Radical Empiricism" that clear distinctions of type and category are a constant but unwritten goal of scientific reasoning, so that when they are discovered, success is declared. But if aspects of the world are organized differently, involving inherent and intractable ambiguities, then scientific questions are often considered unresolved. A hesitation to declare success upon the discovery of ambiguities leaves heterarchy at an artificial and subjective disadvantage in the scope of human knowledge. A heterarchy is a system of organization replete with overlap multiplicity mixed ascendancy and/or divergent-but-coexistent patterns of relation This bias is an artifact of an aesthetic or pedagogical preference for hierarchy, and not necessarily an expression of objective observation.

Feminists, Marxists, anarchists, communists, critical theorists and others criticize the hierarchies commonly found within human society, especially in social relationships. Feminism is a discourse that involves various movements theories, and Philosophies which are concerned with the issue of Gender difference, advocate Marxism is the political philosophy and practice derived from the work of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Communism is a Socioeconomic structure that promotes the establishment of an egalitarian, classless, stateless Society based In the Humanities and Social sciences, critical theory is the examination and critique of Society and Literature, drawing from knowledge across Hierarchies are present in all parts of society: in businesses, schools, families, etc. These relationships are often viewed as necessary. However, feminists, marxists, critical theorists and others analyze hierarchy in terms of the values and power that it arbitrarily assigns to one group over another. These scholars look at hierarchy in terms of how it promotes and stabilizes the oppression of women, racial and ethnic minorities, the poor and working classes, gays, lesbians and other sexual minorities, children, the elderly, etc.

Hierarchies in programming

The concept of hierarchies plays a large part in object oriented programming. Object-oriented programming (OOP is a Programming paradigm that uses " objects " and their interactions to design applications and computer programs For more information see Hierarchy (object-oriented programming) and memory hierarchy. In Computer science 's Object-oriented programming, the mapped relationships of sub- and superclasses is known as a Hierarchy. The Hierarchical arrangement of storage in current Computer architectures is called the memory hierarchy.

Containment hierarchy

Main article: containment hierarchy

A containment hierarchy of the subsumption kind is a collection of strictly nested sets. A containment hierarchy is a Hierarchical collection of strictly nested sets. Each entry in the hierarchy designates a set such that the previous entry is a strict superset, and the next entry is a strict subset. For example, all rectangles are quadrilaterals, but not all quadrilaterals are rectangles, and all squares are rectangles, but not all rectangles are squares. (See also: Taxonomy. Taxonomy is the practice and science of classification The word comes from the Greek, taxis (meaning 'order' 'arrangement' and, nomos ) A containment hierarchy of the compositional kind refers to parts and wholes, as well as to rates of change. Generally the bigger changes more slowly. Parts are contained in wholes and change more rapidly than do wholes.

Social hierarchies

Main article: Social hierarchy

Many human organizations, such as governments, educational institutions, businesses, churches, armies and political movements are hierarchical organizations, at least officially; commonly seniors, called "bosses", have more power than their subordinates. Within the field of Computer science, specifically in the area of Formal languages, the Chomsky hierarchy (occasionally referred to as Chomsky–Schützenberger Social hierarchy is a multi-tiered pyramid-like social or functional structure having an apex as the centralization of power An organization (or organisation &mdash see spelling differences) is a social arrangement which pursues collective goals which controls its own performance and A business (also called firm or an enterprise) is a legally recognized organizational entity designed to provide goods and/or services to A hierarchical organization structured in a way such that every entity in the organization except one is Subordinate to a single other entity Power is a measure of a person's ability to control the environment around them including the behavior of other people Thus the relationship defining this hierarchy is "commands" or "has power over". Some analysts question whether power "actually" works in the way the traditional organizational chart indicates, however. This view tends to emphasize the significance of the informal organization. The informal organization is the interlocking Social structure that governs how people work together in practice See also chain of command. In a Military context the chain of command is the line of authority and responsibility along which orders are passed within a Military unit and between different

See also

References

  1. ^ Hierarches, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, at Perseus
  2. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  3. ^ Simpson, John, ed. A heterarchy is a system of organization replete with overlap multiplicity mixed ascendancy and/or divergent-but-coexistent patterns of relation Definition Homoarchy is “the relation of elements to one another when they are rigidly ranked one way only and thus possess no (or not more than very limited potential A holarchy, in the terminology of Arthur Koestler, is a Hierarchy of holons &mdash where a holon is both a part and a whole ; Edmund Weiner, ed. (1989). Oxford English Dictionary. Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-861186-2.  
  4. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (2002). Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, Inc. . ISBN 0-87779-201-1.  
  5. ^ CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Hierarchy

Further reading

External links

Dictionary

hierarchy

-noun

  1. A body of authoritative officials organized in nested ranks.
  2. Any group of objects ranked so that every one but the topmost is subordinate to a specified one above it.
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