Friday, August 5

In 1977 I came across a cool book while a freshman at the University of Michigan’s Alice Lloyd dorm.  I mention the dorm because if not for their “community courses” offered only to residents, I would not have read The Human Use of Human Beings, Cybernetics and Society - 1950, by Norbert Wiener.  Each month we were assigned a topic to read up on then discuss as a “community.”  Last month I found on Amazon the paperback I remembered reading back then available for one penny plus shipping.  It has a cool cover of a head with various compartments in it that contain cubby hole like items.  It is about the relationship between computer technology and the social sciences.  Professor Wiener taught at MIT and was known for among many things, getting his Ph.D. from  Harvard at age 18.