HISTORY OF ENGINEERING & TECHNOLOGY. A sweeping exploration of man's relationship with machines, and the inventions and myths that shape our world.As lives offline and online merge even more, it is easy to forget how we got here. As lives offline and online merge even more, it's easy to forget how we got here. Rise of the Machines reclaims the spectacular story of cybernetics, a control theory of man and machine. In a history that unpacks one of the twentieth century's pivotal ideas, Thomas Rid delivers a thought-provoking portrait of our technology-enraptured era. Springing from the febrile mind of mathematician Norbert Wiener amid the devastation of World War II, the cybernetic vision underpinned a host of seductive myths about the future of machines. This vision would radically transform the postwar world, ushering in sweeping cultural change.

Unabridged. Title from container. Compact discs.