17 quotes
Further, as every law of nature implies the existence of an invariant, it follows that every law of nature is a constraint.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
Cybernetics treats not things but ways of behaving.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
The concept of "variety" [is] inseparable from that of "information."
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
When a constraint exists advantage can usually be taken of it.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
Such a system is “self-organizing” in the sense that it changes from “parts separated” to “parts joined.”
By a state of a system is meant any well-defined condition or property that can be recognised if it occurs again. Every system will naturally have many possible states.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
All the changes that may occur with time are naturally included, for when plants grow and planets age and machines move some change from one state to another is implicit.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
Every isolated determinate dynamic system, obeying unchanging laws, will ultimately develop some sort of organisms that are adapted to their environments.
Ashby (1962)
The most basic facts in biology are that this earth is now two thousand million years old, and that the biologist studies mostly that which exists today.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
If intellectual power is to be developed, we must somehow construct amplifiers for intelligence — devices that, supplied with a little intelligence, will emit a lot.
The fundamental questions in regulation and control can be answered only when we are able to consider the broader set of what it might do, when “might” is given some exact specification.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
[Constraint] is a relation between two sets, and occurs when the variety that exists under one condition is less than the variety that exists under another.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
Throughout, we shall be exemplifying the thesis of D. M. MacKay: that quantity of information, as measured here, always corresponds to some quantity, i.e. intensity, of selection, either actual or imaginable
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
As shorthand, when the phenomena are suitably simple, words such as equilibrium and stability are of great value and convenience. Nevertheless, it should be always borne in mind that they are mere shorthand, and that the phenomena will not always have the simplicity that these words presuppose.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)
Every stable system has the property that if displaced from a state of equilibrium and released, the subsequent movement is so matched to the initial displacement that the system is brought back to the state of equilibrium. A variety of disturbances will therefore evoke a variety of matched reactions.
Design for a Brain: The Origin of Adaptive Behavior (1952)
The primary fact is that all isolated state-determined dynamic systems are selective: from whatever state they have initially, they go towards states of equilibrium. These states of equilibrium are always characterised, in their relation to the change-inducing laws of the system, by being exceptionally resistant.
Design for a Brain: The Origin of Adaptive Behavior (1952)
Variety can destroy variety.
An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956)