Yesterday, a conversation with a friend veered into the convoluted history of post-WWII scientific and technological development, and the various characters that drove it. During the conversation, we unavoidably veered into cybernetics, that long forgotten systematization of theories around feedback and control systems, which at the time appeared so promising, but are now at best ignored, and at worst reviled.
When reading the history of cybernetics, it is hard to not get swept up by the eager and earnest romanticism of it, and the tenderness with which the various characters discuss the ideas.