Within our Society, these compulsions are expressed in the SIGs. There each general theory is tested, developed, and applied to disciplines, professions, and problems and integrated with other general theories. In the absence of a specialist-styled core of knowledge, the SIGs act as search engines within the ISSS, providing orderly paths for newcomers to find their way into the diverse but systemically integrated body of knowledge that constitutes systems science. I predict that out of these activities an embryonic science of the general will emerge, drawing together the less general cores of various systems sciences. This system of synthesis is often misunderstood by those members who come and go as their particular interests are stimulated and wane.
Many organizations have SIGs, but that acronym stands for special interest groups in most.
We all know that special interest groups tend to fragment organizations as well as knowledge. The ISSS is not a conglomerate that grows by fragmenting into special interest groups as members specialize in limited aspects of a discipline. It is the opposite. Through special integration groups, our society synthesizes diverse disciplinal knowledge into cohesive wholes, systemically integrating that knowledge. Curiously enough, as organizations of special interest groups grow by increasing the number of their special interest groups, the ISSS grows as we increase the number of our special integration groups.