From: "Jeffrey E." <jeevacation@gmail.com>
To: John Brockman <
Subject: Re: my book project
Date: Fri, 08 Jul 2016 14:11:22 +0000
great. can we speak today
On Fri, Jul 8, 2016 at 10:02 AM, John Brockman < > wrote:
Dear XXXX,
As discussed, I am keen on producing an edited volume for our times as an update to Norbert Wiener's THE
HUMAN USE OF HUMAN BEINGS, published sixty-six years ago. The plan is to ask 50 leading thinkers to
read the book and help create a meta-book by writing new and original essays from their individual
perspectives. I was very impressed by your 20xx book "xxxxxxxxx", and I am sure you would have insightful
and interesting things to say. See attached file.
I've been at this since 1965, when the composer John Cage reached across the table at dinner and handed me
CYBERNETICS, saying "this is for you". I never did meet Wiener who had recently died, but also in 1965 his
colleagues A.K. Soloman and Walter Rosenblith called ne at Film-Makers' Cinematheque to ask if I would
bring some NY artists I was working with at the Expanded Cinema Festival to a meeting to discuss how they
were exploring cybernetic ideas. None of the people from the MIT-Harvard group (that also included Harold
Edgerton and Anthony Oettinger) were called computer scientists because, at that time, there was only one
computer at MIT. And I got to see it. Fifty-one years later, here I am, writing to you about Wiener and his
vision.
Interested?
Hope you are enjoying your summer.
Best,
JB
John Brockman
mobile
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