6 Cybernetics
(Ashby 1956, p. 4)
6.1 Introduction
Norbert Wiener defined cybernetics as the study of “control and communication in the animal and the machine” and used this definition as the subtitle of his book Cybernetics (1948). It provides the clues as to its origins in biology and in engineering. As soon as Wiener begins to consider regulation in biological systems, he turns to Cannon's research on homeostasis. The same is true of Ashby in An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956), that other foundational text of the trans‐discipline. Cannon's work in biology was touched upon in Section 3.2. We will now look at the contribution of engineering to the development of cybernetics by considering two key concepts developed in that discipline as it sought to enhance its ability to design and operate complex machines.
The first of these concepts is “negative feedback control.” Otto Mayr (1975) has charted the historical origins of feedback devices applied in water clocks, thermostats, and windmills. Ktesibios of Alexandria, in the third century BCE, used a float valve, similar to the mechanism employed in modern flush toilets, to enable his water clock to keep the time. The first automatic temperature ...