Cybernetics Cybernetics Cybernetics is a transdisciplinary approach for exploring regulatory systems—their structures, constraints, and possibilities. Norbert Wiener defined cybernetics in 1948 as "the scientific study of control and communication in the animal and the machine." In the 21st century, the term is often used in a rather loose way to imply "control of any system using technology." In other words, it is the scientific study of how humans, animals and machines control and communicate with each other. Cybernetics is applicable when a system being analyzed incorporates a closed signaling loop—originally referred to as a "circular causal" relationship—that is, where action by
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding plans of action to achieve their goals, and thus would seem to have a causal insight which transcends mere custom. An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding is a book by the Scottish empiricist philosopher David Hume, published in English in 1748. It was a revision of an earlier effort, Hume's "A Treatise of Human Nature", published anonymously in London in 1739–40. Hume was disappointed with the reception of the "Treatise", which "fell dead-born from the press," as he put it, and so tried again to disseminate his more developed ideas to the public by writing a