Reintroducing Wiener: Channeling Norbert in the 21st Century

Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman, authors of the biography "Dark Hero of the Information Age," presented a vivid portrait of Wiener's remarkable life. They chronicled his trajectory as a child prodigy who entered college at 11 and earned his PhD at 18, his foundational contributions to communication theory and Brownian motion, and his wartime work on anti-aircraft prediction systems that led directly to his landmark 1948 book "Cybernetics." They also captured his legendary absent-mindedness, which became part of MIT folklore.

The biographers emphasized Wiener's profound post-war ethical transformation, including his influential article "A Scientist Rebels," in which he refused to participate in military research. They described his early and prescient warnings about automation displacing workers, concerns that have become even more relevant in the age of artificial intelligence. Conway and Siegelman argued that Wiener deserves recognition not only as a brilliant mathematician but as one of the first scientists to grapple seriously with the social responsibilities of technological innovation.