MECHANICISM in CYBERNETICS
| Collection | International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics |
|---|---|
| Year | 2004 |
| Vol. (num.) | 2(1) |
| ID | ◀ 2050 ▶ |
| Object type | General information, Epistemology, ontology or semantics |
According to J.L.LE MOIGNE, the cybernetic paradigm may be considered “as an extreme form of the mecanicist paradigm” (1990, p.33).
This is in fact mainly the case of the first cybernetics as it was proposed and explained by N. WIENER who, as a practically oriented mathematician, insisted on the “control and communication in the animal and the machine”.
It is indeed obvious that these first cybernetic models maintained a quite reductionist bias and were mainly applied to stabilization problems by introduction of strictly limitative constraints. It was mainly by the use of negative feedback that these were introduced, even if only a convenient sequence of negative and positive feedbacks is apt to produce a permanent regulation.
This initial cybernetic mechanicism made cybernetics quite suspect to psychologists and sociologists, who feared its possible use to justify or even organize some “Big Brother” type of social and individual control.
These qualms unfortunately closed their minds to M. MARUYAMA's 2nd Cybernetics (processes of deviation and amplification by mutual causality) and still more so to the cybernetics of 2nd order of H von FOERSTER, related to self- organizing systems, and to the conversation concepts of G. PASK.