Von Bertalanffy's Ph. D. thesis was on the philosophy of Gustav Theodor Fechner, an epigon of the Philosophy of Nature movement, who was also the founder on psychophysics and experimental esthetics, Fechner, like all the other Philosophers of Nature rejected the reductionist-atomist view of nature. He believed that the universe was a living system existing at a higher level than man. It was governed in addition to the law of causality by the laws of 'stability' and of 'repetition.' These three principles causality, stability and repetition governed biological and psychological phenomena.

p. 3 - Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901-1972) (1989)