Comparative study of control and communication in living organisms and machines.
The study of control systems, such as the nervous system, in living organisms and the development of equivalent systems in electronic and mechanical devices. Cybernetics compares similarities and differences between living and nonliving systems (whether those systems comprise individuals, groups, or societies) and is based on theories of communication and control that can be applied to either living or nonliving systems or both. See also bionics.
The field of science concerned with processes of communication and control (especially the comparison of these processes in biological and artificial systems).
Science concerned with how systems organize, regulate, and reproduce themselves, and also how they evolve and learn. In the laboratory, inanimate objects are created that behave like living systems. Applications range from the creation of electronic artificial limbs to the running of the fully automated factory where decisionmaking machines operate up to managerial level.
Cybernetics was founded and named in 1947 by US mathematician Norbert Wiener. Originally, it was the study of control systems using feedback to produce automatic processes.