“These broader applications of cybernetics were an almost unequivocal failure.“ This is incorrect. There are no “cybernetics” department at universities, nor p

“These broader applications of cybernetics were an almost unequivocal failure.“ This is incorrect. There are no “cybernetics” department at universities, nor people with this title or role. However the concepts and ideas from cybernetics have infiltrated and influenced most areas of science. If you trace the ideas you will find them, you will recognize the DNA. The ideas from cybernetics + information theory was a paradigm shift in science at the time. I would say the cybernetic ideas were a victim of its own success. It became subsumed into many other disciplines by other names. It is like a snake eating its own tail. See the Ouroboros symbol [0] . “Finally, because of his emphasis on control” Here he is assuming control means too-down with a naive view of control. Control here could be replaced with regulation, direction, steering, facilitation. I would define control as the mechanism that allows a system to achieve it's purpose in an efficient and effective way. This definition says nothing about top-down. In actual fact there is a concept within cybernetics of "self-regulation" or "internal control". This means that control must be exhibited from within the system and not from an external party. "Wiener could not foresee a technological world in which innovation and self-organization bubble up from the bottom rather than being imposed from the top." Within the field of there is a ton of material on self-organization. This was one of the topics that was specifically investigated and written about at length. In particular how do you design for "self-organization"? Staford Beer and the organizational cybernetician were specifically focused on maximizing freedom, by balancing of both bottom up, and top-down feedback loops. While Weiner did give the field the name i would hesitate in calling him the "father" of the field. Alot of the ideas were developed in collaboration with others, particularly at the Macy conferences [1]. The ideas have a long history and cybernetics has been heavily influenced by Ashby, Beer, Shannon, Maturana, Van Forester etc. Cybernetics itself born out of the tradition of operational research and systems engineering. [0] https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Serpiente_alquimica.jpg# https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Serpiente_alquimic... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macy_conferences https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macy_conferences