Living in Cybernetics (PDF)

On the 3rd of August 2014 the American Society for Cybernetics (ASC) celebrated their 50th anniversary at their annual conference, which that year was held in Washington DC, hosted by George Washington University. The choice of venue reflected the fact that the first conference of the ASC was held in the same city in 1964. The proceedings from this celebratory conference are presented in this e-book. The last three conference proceedings have been published showing the commitment from both sides to advance the field through the dissemination of cybernetics research. The conference took place from the 3rd to the 9th of August 2014, with the theme of Living in Cybernetics.The conference was composed of three parts. Following an introductory workshop on the first day, two days of parallel paper sessions featured submissions covering the wide variety of Cybernetics in the Present. Articles developed from these papers are collected here. The conference concluded with a two day workshop on Cybernetics in the Future, facilitated by David Griffiths and Robert Martin, which developed material with a view to the future development of the subject and its ideas, especially amongst younger generations. Sandwiched between these two sections, and one of the highlights of the conference, was a day entitled Cybernetics in the Past, bringing together the still living former presidents of the ASC, who each addressed the conference, and participated in a panel responding to questions from the audience. The ASC president at the time, Ranulph Glanville, was unable to be present in person and attended the conference via Skype. Mary Catherine Bateson gave the conference dinner speech , in which she asked if cybernetics should be 'a fancy, post-graduate activity', or if we should rather treat it as an invitation to revise our ideas of common sense. Throughout these various activities, the conference reflected on past and present in order to move forward with new actions.