Basic Concepts of Cybernetics: USSR
Abstract
As in the case of other disciplines it is hard to fix the exact time when cybernetics was born. The fact of the matter is that certain formulations of problems and a number of ideas relating to the field appeared long before our time. It can be said, however, that the shaping of cybernetics into a scientific discipline began in the middle of the twentieth century. This process was fostered by a series of problems presented by practice. Among them we must include the need for intricate computing machines, the automation of production, the automation of certain thinking actions and the study of the mechanisms involved in heredity, evolution, and nervous activity. The first attempt to present a unified exposition of cybernetics was made by N. Wiener in 1948. Since, however, Wiener's "Cybernetics" dealt more with the ideal side of the question, controversies arose among a broad segment of scientists. Some of them, while recognizing cybernetics, demanded a clearer definition of the subject and formulations of its fundamental problems; others, while finding nothing unscientific in cybernetics, said that it "as at best a mechanical combination of a number of questions or that it "as a part of automatics; still others, not have fully grasped the facts, regarded cybernetics as an attempt to create a new "science of sciences" and therefore called it a scientific fraud." In this paper we offer an exposition of the basic concepts of cybernetics, with the intention of filling the gaps referred to above. The conception on which the paper is based arose in 1955 and the writer has used it in different variations in reports on cybernetics.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 11, 1960
- Accession Number
- ADA354472
Entities
People
- S. V. Yablonskiy
Organizations
- Joint Publications Research Service