IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/h/spr/sprchp/978-981-15-0720-5_66.html
   My bibliography  Save this book chapter

Cybernetics Approaches and Models

In: Handbook of Systems Sciences

Author

Listed:
  • Allenna Leonard

    (Cwarel Isaf Institute)

  • Tom Scholte

    (University of British Colombia)

  • Ken Shepherd

    (Global Organization Design Society)

  • Joe Truss

    (Team Syntegrity Inc.)

Abstract

From its beginnings, cybernetic perspectives and models were designed to understand or regulate dynamic processes. The approaches and models described in this chapter range from the explicit to the implicit but have in common the central role of feedback as a guide for action and understanding. Feedback and the recognition of the importance of the observer in defining the system and its purposes are the common factor in a cybernetic approach. The Watt steam governor was an early and clear example of intrinsic control – using feedback to bring a system back under control in the act of going out of control. The steam governor’s arms rise and cut off air to the steam engine as it goes too fast and lower to allow in more air when its speed comes back under control. Its purpose was the safe operation of the engine. The origin of the word cybernetics comes from the Greek word for steersmanship. The sailor adjusts the tiller and the sails to use the forces of the winds and tides to reach a destination. It is the same root as the word for governance.

Suggested Citation

  • Allenna Leonard & Tom Scholte & Ken Shepherd & Joe Truss, 2021. "Cybernetics Approaches and Models," Springer Books, in: Gary S. Metcalf & Kyoichi Kijima & Hiroshi Deguchi (ed.), Handbook of Systems Sciences, chapter 3, pages 67-86, Springer.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-981-15-0720-5_66
    DOI: 10.1007/978-981-15-0720-5_66
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Cybernetics; Models;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-981-15-0720-5_66. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.