Encyclopedia of Computer Science and Technology

510 Wiener, Norbertcomplexity . . .,” then indeed the computer scientist musttake responsibility for his or her creations. This is the challengethat Weizenbaum believes has not been taken seriouslyenough.As the 1960s progressed, the United States plunged intothe Vietnam War, and racial tension crackled in the streetsof major cities. Weizenbaum became increasingly concernedthat technology was being used for warlike and oppressivepurposes. As an activist, Weizenbaum campaigned againstwhat he saw as the misuse of technology for military purposessuch as missiles and missile defense systems. He wasfounder of a group called Computer Professionals againstthe ABM (anti-ballistic missile).Weizenbaum does not consider himself to be a Luddite,however, and he is not without recognition of thepotential good that can come from computer technology,though he believes that this potential can only be realizedif humans change their attitudes toward nature and theirfellow humanity.During the 1970s and 1980s Weizenbaum not onlytaught at MIT, but also lectured or served as a visiting professorat a number of institutions, including the Center forAdvanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences at StanfordUniversity (1972–73), Harvard University (1973–74), andcoming full circle, the Technical University of Berlin andthe University of Hamburg.In 1988 Weizenbaum retired from MIT. That same yearhe received the Norbert Wiener Award for Professionaland Social Responsibility from Computer Professionalsfor Social Responsibility (CPSR). In 1991 he was given theNamur Award of the International Federation for InformationProcessing. He also received European honors suchas the Humboldt Prize from the Alexander von HumboldtFoundation in Germany.Further ReadingBen-Aaron, Diana. “Weizenbaum Examines Computers [and]Society.” The Tech (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)vol. 105, April 9, 1985. Available online. URL: http://wwwtech.mit.edu/V105/N16/weisen.16n.html.Accessed December4, 2007.ELIZA [running as a Java Applet]. Available online. URL: http://www.manifestation.com/neurotoys/eliza.php3. AccessedDecember 4, 2007.Henderson, Harry. Artificial Intelligence: Mirrors for the Mind. NewYork: Chelsea House, 2007.Weizenbaum, Joseph. Computer Power and Human Reason. SanFrancisco: W. H. Freeman, 1976.“Weizenbaum: Rebel at Work” [information about and excerptsfrom a film by Peter Haas]. Available online. URL: http://www.ilmarefilm.org/W_E_1.htm. Accessed December 4,2007.Wiener, Norbert(1894–1964)AmericanMathematician, PhilosopherNorbert Wiener developed the theory of cybernetics, or theprocess of communication and control in both machinesand living things. His work has had an important impactboth on philosophy and on design principles.Wiener was born on November 26, 1894, in Columbia,Missouri. His father was a linguist at Harvard University,and spurred an interest in communication which the boycombined with an avid pursuit of mathematics and science(particularly biology). A child prodigy, Wiener startedreading at age three, entered Tufts University at age 11,and earned his B.A. in 1909 at the age of 14, after concludingthat his lack of manual dexterity made biological worktoo frustrating. He earned his M.A. in mathematics fromHarvard only three years later, and his Harvard Ph.D. inmathematical logic just a year later in 1913. He then traveledto Europe, where he met leading mathematicians suchas Bertrand Russell, G. H. Hardy, Alfred North Whitehead,and David Hilbert. When the United States entered WorldWar I, Wiener served at Aberdeen Proving Ground, wherehe designed artillery firing tables.After the war, Wiener was appointed as an instructorat MIT, where he would serve until his retirement in 1960.However, he continued to travel widely, serving as a GuggenheimFellow at Copenhagen and Göttingen in 1926, anda visiting lecturer at Cambridge (1931–32) and Tsing-HuaUniversity in Beijing (1935–36). Wiener’s scientific interestsproved to be as wide as his travels, including research intostochastic and random processes (such as the Brownianmotion of microscopic particles) where he sought more generalmathematical tools for the analysis of irregularity.During the 1930s, Wiener began to work more closelywith MIT electrical engineers who were building mechanicalcomputers (see Bush, Vannevar and analog computer). Helearned about feedback controls and servomechanisms thatenabled machines to respond to forces in the environment.During World War II, he did secret military researchwith an engineer, Julian Bigelow, on antiaircraft gun controlmechanisms, including methods for predicting thefuture position of an aircraft based upon limited and possiblyerroneous information.Wiener became particularly interested in the feedbackloop—the process by which an adjustment is made on thebasis of information (such as from radar) to a predictednew position, a new reading is taken and a new adjustmentmade, and so on. (He had first encountered these conceptsat MIT with his friend and colleague Harold Hazen.) Theuse of “negative feedback” made it possible to design systemsthat would progressively adjust themselves such as byintercepting a target. More generally, it suggested mechanismsby which a machine (perhaps a robot) could progressivelywork toward a goal.Wiener’s continuing interest in biology led him alwaysto relate what he was learning about control and feedbackmechanisms to the behavior of living organisms. He had followedthe work of Arturo Rosenbleuth, a Mexican physiologistwho was studying neurological conditions that appearedto result from excessive or inaccurate feedback. (Unlike thehelpful negative feedback, positive feedback in effect amplifieserrors and sends a system swinging out of control.)By the end of World War II, Wiener, Rosenbleuth, theneuropsychiatrist Warren McCulloch, and the logician