1. Cybernetics and Feedback Control
A whirlwind tour including applications
to robots and everyday life

2. Cybernetics and Feedback Control
Possibly the central idea in engineering, including also chemical and biological systems
Thousands of years old, but lost to Western civilization (along with many other ideas) until rediscovered in 1600s
Crucial in AI & art robotics as well

3. What is Feedback Control?
A self-regulating system where there is a goal state and a way of measuring the system’s current state. This generates an error signal which is used to guide the system toward the goal state.

4. An Example: Balancing

5. Chinese Water Clock
Large basin of water, with float valve to maintain constant volume
This created constant pressure on aperture, which caused constant water flow
Mechanical apparatus to measure flow

6. Chinese Water Clock

7. Brief History of Feedback Systems
B.C. … Chinese water clocks
mid 1600s … Hubbell’s ovens (chicken hatcheries)
late 1700s … James Watt’s steam engine governor
1800s … automata
early 1900s … classical control theory (telephone signaling; warship control)
1940s … Norbert Weiner (“cybernetics”) and WWII weaponry
1950s … Macy conferences; W. Grey Walter’s turtles
1960s … A.I.

8. Watt’s Steam Engine Governor

9. Cabaret Mechanical Theatre

10. Walter’s machina speculatrix

11. the water clock lives on…