Topic · 3 articles

Politics and Governance

Planning economies, steering societies, and regulating the systems that steer us.

Why We Need Cybernetics in the Age of AI

AI systems are feedback systems embedded in larger feedback systems. Five cybernetic questions that today's AI debate keeps circling without naming.

The Editors 16 October 2026

Foundations

A Very Brief History of Cybernetics

From wartime gun predictors to the Macy Conferences, Soviet planning, Chilean socialism, and the internet: eighty years in five phases.

The Editors 3 October 2026

Ex Machinis

The Recommendation Machine: A Cybernetic Reading of AI

The AI behind your feed is among the most consequential feedback machines ever built. What does cybernetics tell us about why it behaves the way it does?

The Editors 17 April 2026