Claim and evidence Close ×
Wiener’s Cybernetics (1948, read in the 2019 reissue) states that the modern industrial revolution is bound to devalue the human brain, at least in its simpler and more routine decisions, and that, taking that revolution as accomplished, the average human being of mediocre attainments or less has nothing to sell that it is worth anyone’s money to buy. Copy claim link
Copy claim reference
Machine-checked Stated in source Supported
Supporting evidence: primary · 1 source
Date 1948 · publication Records dated 1948 → Wording attested 2019. Read in the MIT Press reissue (2019) of the second edition of 1961; the 1948 and 1961 printings were not compared. Role Articulation Register (kind of text) Nonfiction Tier Tier 2. A mathematician’s book, not an economist’s scholarly work or a core economics venue, by the collection’s rule of 2026-10-11. Scope and limits A statement about the effect of automation of routine decisions on the market value of ordinary labour, made in the book’s introduction. The book adds that ‘the answer’ is a society based on human values other than buying or selling.
The evidence 02 primary source Supports the claim
Cybernetics, or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine (reissue of the 1961 second edition) ↗ Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2019 (open access, CC BY-NC-ND 4.0); Internet Archive item mit_press_book_9780262355902 · 1948
Copy source reference
Cite the original source Cite the original document, not Selekoa. Check these details against it.
Copy APA
Download BibTeX Download RIS Download CSL-JSON
Source excerpt “The modern industrial revolution is similarly bound to devalue the human brain, at least in its simpler and more routine decisions.” Location in source Introduction, reissue p. 40
How it was read Retrieved directly from the publisher
Machine-checked · 2026-11-04
Source details and check notes Authors Norbert Wiener Version Retrieved for the candidate pack on 2026-11-02 (SHA-256 88c80833e096c562e62d6519b677966b05d439c00e00cf6fb7dfd8eddb0cbe54) and again at admission on 2026-11-04 (same file). The MIT Press reissue of 2019, catalogued as ‘Reissue of the 1961 second edition’, read in its Internet Archive OCR text. Its contents divide the book into ‘Part I. Original Edition (1948)’ and ‘Part II. Supplementary Chapters (1961)’. The 1961 preface says the first edition had typographical errors and ‘a few errors of content’; the 1948 printing was not compared, so Part I’s wording is attested here from the 2019 reissue only. Canonical address Open the canonical source ↗ Accessed 2026-11-04 Language English (en) Attribution Norbert Wiener, “Cybernetics, or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine (reissue of the 1961 second edition)”, 1948. Reuse CC BY-NC-ND 4.0, as the MIT Press reissue states. Bibliographic metadata, editorial paraphrases and short attributed quotations (at most 50 words each). Recheck terms before wider redistribution. Check notes Candidate pack passage, antecedent texts (research/prehistory). The quotation (21 words) matched a fresh retrieval of 2026-11-04 (SHA-256 88c80833e096…, the file the candidate pack read). Matching ignored differences of whitespace, case, quotation marks, dashes, line-break hyphens and Unicode compatibility forms, so the source’s typography can differ. No human editorial review. primary source Supports the claim
Cybernetics, or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine (reissue of the 1961 second edition) ↗ Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2019 (open access, CC BY-NC-ND 4.0); Internet Archive item mit_press_book_9780262355902 · 1948
Copy source reference
Cite the original source Cite the original document, not Selekoa. Check these details against it.
Copy APA
Download BibTeX Download RIS Download CSL-JSON
Source excerpt “the average human being of mediocre attainments or less has nothing to sell that it is worth anyone’s money to buy.” Location in source Introduction, reissue p. 41
How it was read Retrieved directly from the publisher
Machine-checked · 2026-11-04
Source details and check notes Authors Norbert Wiener Version Retrieved for the candidate pack on 2026-11-02 (SHA-256 88c80833e096c562e62d6519b677966b05d439c00e00cf6fb7dfd8eddb0cbe54) and again at admission on 2026-11-04 (same file). The MIT Press reissue of 2019, catalogued as ‘Reissue of the 1961 second edition’, read in its Internet Archive OCR text. Its contents divide the book into ‘Part I. Original Edition (1948)’ and ‘Part II. Supplementary Chapters (1961)’. The 1961 preface says the first edition had typographical errors and ‘a few errors of content’; the 1948 printing was not compared, so Part I’s wording is attested here from the 2019 reissue only. Canonical address Open the canonical source ↗ Accessed 2026-11-04 Language English (en) Attribution Norbert Wiener, “Cybernetics, or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine (reissue of the 1961 second edition)”, 1948. Reuse CC BY-NC-ND 4.0, as the MIT Press reissue states. Bibliographic metadata, editorial paraphrases and short attributed quotations (at most 50 words each). Recheck terms before wider redistribution. Check notes Candidate pack passage, antecedent texts (research/prehistory). The quotation (21 words) matched a fresh retrieval of 2026-11-04 (SHA-256 88c80833e096…, the file the candidate pack read). Matching ignored differences of whitespace, case, quotation marks, dashes, line-break hyphens and Unicode compatibility forms, so the source’s typography can differ. No human editorial review. Status and meaning Editorial status. Machine-checked . Machines found this record and checked it against its sources; no person accepted it individually. Each evidence record above shows how it was checked.
Relation. A passage of the document meets the proposition’s criterion. The record documents what the text states, in its register (fiction and satire are labelled); it is not evidence that the proposition is true and implies no influence on or from another text.
Date. Part I of the reissue is headed “Original Edition (1948)”; the 1948 printing was not read.
Record ID pre-m06a-wiener-1948-cybernetics