From Newspeak to Cyberspeak: A History of Soviet Cybernetics

Contents......Page 8
Preface and Acknowledgements......Page 12
Introduction: Soviet Science and Politics through the Prism of Language......Page 16
1 The Cold War in Code Words: The Newspeak of Soviet Science......Page 26
Balancing Military and Ideological Priorities for Cold War Science......Page 29
Shifting Boundaries between Knowledge and Ideology......Page 33
Newspeak: The Fundamentals......Page 36
Scientific Newspeak......Page 41
\"Formalism\" as a Floating Signifier......Page 46
From Formulas to \"Formalism\" in Mathematics......Page 48
From Literary Form to \"Formalism\" in Linguistics......Page 52
The Specter of \"Idealism\" in Physiology......Page 57
2 Cyberspeak: A Universal Language for Men and Machines......Page 66
Norbert Wiener and Andrei Kolmogorov: Two Mathematicians Tackle Biology......Page 71
Control via Feedback: The Body as a Servomechanism......Page 76
The Order of Life: The Organism as an Entropy-Reducing Machine......Page 79
Human Communication as an Engineering Problem: Man as an \"Information Source\"......Page 82
The Computer and the Mind as Universal Logical Machines......Page 87
The Logic of the Brain: The Nervous System as a Turing Machine......Page 90
The Computer as a Brain and the Brain as a Computer......Page 94
The Making of Cyberspeak and the Emergence of Cybernetics......Page 98
Cyberspeak Becomes Universal......Page 104
The Cybernetics Bandwagon......Page 111
3 \"Normal Pseudo-Science\"......Page 118
Cybernetic Ideas in a Soviet Context: Pro and Contra......Page 120
\"Russian Scandal\" at the Root of Cybernetics......Page 128
Postwar Ideological Campaigns as Rituals......Page 130
The Cybernetics \"Scandal\"......Page 133
Serial Reproduction of Criticism......Page 141
Computers as \"Mathematical Machines\" of the Cold War......Page 146
The Military Definition of Computing: Technology without Ideology......Page 157
Soviet Computers: A State Secret or a \"Display Technology\"?......Page 161
Newspeak and Cyberspeak, Two Languages of the Cold War......Page 165
Soviet Science in Search of a New Language......Page 168
Soviet Computers: Declassified and Deified......Page 170
The Computer as a Paragon of Objectivity......Page 176
Soviet Philosophy between Scylla and Charybdis......Page 178
The Newspeak Defense of Cybernetics......Page 181
The Military Defense of Cybernetics......Page 188
Cyberspeak Challenges Newspeak......Page 194
Cybernetics and Genetics: A Common Cause......Page 198
Cybernetics Challenges Soviet Philosophy......Page 203
The Legitimization of Cybernetics......Page 208
5 The \"Cybernetization\" of Soviet Science......Page 214
Cybernetics as a \"Trading Zone\"......Page 215
The Council on Cybernetics as an Institutional \"Umbrella\"......Page 219
Biological Cybernetics: Genes as \"Units of Hereditary Information\"......Page 226
The Mathematical \"Axioms of Life\"......Page 229
Physiological Cybernetics: The Brain as a Subject of Technology......Page 233
\"Man is the Most Perfect of All Known Cybernetic Machines . . . \"......Page 239
Cybernetic Linguistics: Making the Study of Language an \"Exact Science\"......Page 242
From Machine Translation to Linguistic Theory......Page 247
The Fate of the Institute of Cybernetics......Page 256
\"What is Cybernetics?\"......Page 261
Soviet Cybernetics as a \"Science of Government\"......Page 268
The \"Dialectical Materialization\" of Cybernetics......Page 272
Cybernetics in Fashion......Page 275
From \"Military Cybernetics\" to \"Economic Cybernetics\"......Page 279
\"Optimal Decision Making on a National Scale\": Aspirations and Constraints......Page 283
\"Optimal Planning\": A Vehicle of Economic Reform or an Obstacle to it?......Page 289
Cybernetics in the Service of the Establishment......Page 294
CyberNewspeak: \"The Scientific Management of Society\"......Page 300
The End of the Cybernetics Game......Page 303
Cyberspeak as a Carnival Language......Page 308
Cyberspeak as an Instrument of Freedom......Page 311
Cyberspeak as a Universal Language of Capitalism and Communism......Page 315
Notes......Page 320
B......Page 376
C......Page 377
G......Page 378
I......Page 379
L......Page 380
M......Page 381
P......Page 382
T......Page 383
Z......Page 384