cybernetics

The story

1. Ancient Greek · borrowed fromκυβερνήτης“steersman”
2. English todaycybernetics

From Ancient Greek κυβερνήτης (kubernḗtēs, “steersman”), from κυβερνάω (kubernáō, “to steer, drive, guide, act as a pilot”) (whence English govern). The term is attested since at least 1948 in the book Cybernetics by Norbert Wiener, influenced by the cognate term and doublet governor, the name of an early control device proposed by James Clerk Maxwell in 1868. Note also the 1830s French cybernétique (“the art of governing”). Also doublet of Kubernetes.

Words from the same roots