Cybernetics in the Republic

IF 0.8 2区 历史学 Q2 HISTORY & PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE
Michele Kennerly
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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Plato's Republic lurks in cybernetics, a word popularly attributed to US American mathematician Norbert Wiener (1894–1964). In his accounts of how he came up with it, however, Wiener never mentions Plato, though he does note it was formed from the ancient Greek word kubernētēs (navigator). Among the earliest popular books about the cybernetics craze are three published in France, and their authors show a special interest in the origin of cybernetics. In something like learned rebukes to Wiener, all three books credit Plato with significant use of kubernē-based terms. This article presents evidence, one, that Wiener knows well he has chosen a word with a Platonic history and, two, that Wiener deems the technical and social climate of ancient Athens (and of the Republic) instructive only as an anti-model for the mid-20th-century United States and so does not feel compelled to associate cybernetics with Plato. Instead, Wiener focuses on the challenges cybernetics and automation pose for his own engineering-oriented, capitalist, multiracial, democratic republic. Wiener's decisions not to use Plato as an authorizing force and not to put ancient Athens on a pedestal merit recognition, since subsequent writers link ancient Athens with cybernation via a presumption that cybernation will enable and fully democratize the sort of leisure activities, including thinking and participation in public life, deemed by some to be emblematic of ancient Athens.
共和国的控制论
柏拉图的理想国潜藏在控制论中,这个词通常被认为是美国数学家诺伯特·维纳(1894-1964)发明的。然而,在描述他是如何想出这个词的时候,维纳从来没有提到柏拉图,尽管他确实注意到这个词是由古希腊单词kubernētēs(航海家)形成的。在最早的关于控制论狂热的流行书籍中,有三本是在法国出版的,它们的作者对控制论的起源表现出特别的兴趣。在对维纳的学术谴责中,这三本书都认为柏拉图大量使用了kubernē-based术语。这篇文章提供的证据,一,维纳清楚地知道他选择了一个具有柏拉图历史的词,二,维纳认为,古代雅典(和理想国)的技术和社会氛围,只是作为20世纪中期美国的反模型,具有指导意义,因此,他不觉得有必要将控制论与柏拉图联系起来。相反,维纳关注的是控制论和自动化给他自己的以工程为导向的、资本主义的、多种族的民主共和国带来的挑战。维纳决定不把柏拉图当作权威,也不把古雅典放在一个基座上,这值得肯定,因为后来的作家把古雅典和网络国家联系在一起,他们认为网络国家将使一些休闲活动(包括思考和参与公共生活)成为可能,并使其完全民主化,这些活动被一些人视为古雅典的象征。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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来源期刊
History of the Human Sciences
History of the Human Sciences 综合性期刊-科学史与科学哲学
CiteScore
1.60
自引率
11.10%
发文量
31
审稿时长
>12 weeks
期刊介绍: History of the Human Sciences aims to expand our understanding of the human world through a broad interdisciplinary approach. The journal will bring you critical articles from sociology, psychology, anthropology and politics, and link their interests with those of philosophy, literary criticism, art history, linguistics, psychoanalysis, aesthetics and law.
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