The Basics of Cybernetics

In accordance with a broad application of cybernetics, there were several attempts during its development phase to define it and delimit it against related fields like systems theory or informatics. 

In order to utilize the cybernetic approach for the science of safety, it would help if one would regard cybernetics as the general science of cybernetic systems. Its tasks and goals within the meaning of this treatise can be described as follows  

This makes it possible to cross the boundaries between various disci plines when describing the behavior of systems, and thus lays the foundation of the interdisciplinary character of cybernetics. 

The cybernetic description of systems of different types is characterized by concepts and definitions like feedback, delay time, stochastic processes, and stability. These aspects will, for the time being, be demonstrated on the control loop as an example of a simple cybernetic system, but one that contains all typical properties. Thereby the importance of the probability calculus and communication in cybernetics can be clearly explained. This is then followed by a general representation of cybernetic systems. 

Feeding back the information on the actual liquid level to the correcting device acting as a regulator and the adaptation of the added liquid amount Qg will guarantee that the deviation of the liquid level from the specified value will remain negligible, as demanded by the function of the container. 

---

The basic merit of the cybernetic approach is that it adopts a mathematically simple description of a complex organism but compensates for the oversimplification by assigning an optimal control motive to its response. The implication is that the elaborate internal machinery of the cell provides the organism with the facility to implement the calculated control policy. 

General Representation of Cybernetic Systems. The control circuit which has been used in this connection to illustrate several basic concepts in cybernetics constitutes an especially simplified version of a cybernetic system. Referring to this special case, a genera cybernetic system can be defined as a structure consisting of system elements (SE) with input quantities E and output quantities A (Figure 3.9). 

In accordance with the basic abstraction of the cybernetic system, the following must in essence be achieved (Figure 3.16) ... 

Man and machine are embedded in their environment. The latter is the third important cornerstone within the basic cybernetic model. Accidents and loss on the part of the machine, caused by the operation of the machine by man, may have a deleterious effect on the environment. On the other hand, there are a multitude of natural processes within the environment, eg., earthquakes and disastrous storms, etc., as well as disasters of a technical origin, like fires or explosions, which have a damaging effect on the machine. 

Now we give a few examples of different types of control circuits. TTiey are meant to underline the general character of the above-mentioned basic elements of rationalization in cybernetic thinking. 

Figure 3.12 Basic cybernetic schematic design of the man-machine-environment-system (MMES).

---