It's only one answer and it doesn't give sources for its claim, so I'm not sure the claim about the Wieners being Trostkyists or socialists should be taken at t

It's only one answer and it doesn't give sources for its claim, so I'm not sure the claim about the Wieners being Trostkyists or socialists should be taken at their word. That said, according to his Wikipedia article, Norbert Wiener was a pacifist and didn't shy away from crediting Soviet researchers and sharing his work with them as with any other part of the international scientific community. Considering he was active during the McCarthy era, anything more tangible than that could have likely been career-ending so I would take those claims with a grain of salt. Given that these claims allegedly stem from Lettvin, who again according to his Wikipedia article strongly believed in individual rights but opposed the AAA&S withdrawing an award from someone for vocally supporting literal fascism (the article mentions Kropotkin as an early influence but the emphasis on "individual rights" reads more right-libertarian than socialist), and given the historical context (McCarthyism), I would read any such claim as an accusation and attempt at defamation rather than trivia. It's worth mentioning that the political spectrum is fuzzy and many-facetted and individuals can hold contradictory beliefs with regard to the ideologies they profess, especially when condensed to a one-dimensional gradient. It's entirely possible that Wiener's wife (or he himself) was conservative and yet an "ardent socialist". Pacifism is widely regarded as a leftist position (if only because it was often seen treasonous and "communism" was the label for the enemy). The Soviet Union (which seems relevant if the Wieners were interested in Trostky's ideas) was culturally conservative in many ways: while it was decades ahead in gender equality, queerness was seen as bourgeois perversion and "bohemian" lifestyles were largely seen as counter-revolutionary.