# Feedback Channel **Domain:** Cybernetics / Communication / Governance **Doc Type:** Concept Node **Maturity:** Developing **Related:** [[Feedback Loops]], [[Error Signal]], [[Administrative Control Systems]], [[Russia and Prussia Kybernetiks]] --- ## Definition The path by which measurements of a system’s effects return to a regulator and inform subsequent action. ## Kybernetiks Context Inspectorates, dashboards, tests and telemetry become feedback channels when their reports alter instruction or institutional policy. ## Relationships - **Historical control problem:** [[wiki/Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation|Norbert Wiener's 1960 paper]] explains why a feedback channel can fail when a machine acts faster than a human can interpret and intervene. - **Corpus route:** [[wiki/Control Theory|Control Theory]] and [[articles/AI Escape Is the Wrong Metaphor|AI Escape Is the Wrong Metaphor]] connect feedback latency to machine agency; [[collections/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] situates the longer transition. ## Backlinks [[Russia and Prussia Kybernetiks]] · [[articles/Russia and Prussia Kybernetiks|Russia and Prussia Kybernetiks]] ## Simple Reminders, Quotations, and Thoughts From [[wiki/Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation|Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation]]: The driving analogy illustrates intervention latency rather than claiming every machine is uncontrollable. > "By the very slowness of our human actions, our effective control of our machines may be nullified. By the time we are able to react to information conveyed by our senses and stop the car we are driving, it may already have run head on into a wall." > **— Norbert Wiener**, *1960, “Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation,” Science 131(3410)* [[reminders/AI Control/Human Reaction Can Be Too Slow for Machine Control by Norbert Wiener|Human Reaction Can Be Too Slow for Machine Control by Norbert Wiener]] From [[wiki/Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation|Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation]]: Wiener makes the gap between incoming data and human intervention the governing variable. > "Similarly, when a machine constructed by us is capable of operating on its incoming data at a pace which we cannot keep, we may not know, until too late, when to turn it off." > **— Norbert Wiener**, *1960, “Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation,” Science 131(3410)* [[reminders/AI Control/A Faster Machine May Pass the Point of Shutdown by Norbert Wiener|A Faster Machine May Pass the Point of Shutdown by Norbert Wiener]] From [[wiki/Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation|Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation]]: The rate mismatch is a design constraint for effective feedback and intervention. > "One of the chief causes of the danger of disastrous consequences in the use of the learning machine is that man and machine operate on two distinct time scales, so that the machine is much faster than man and the two do not gear together without serious difficulties." > **— Norbert Wiener**, *1960, “Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation,” Science 131(3410)* [[reminders/Cybernetics/Human and Machine Time Scales Can Fail to Mesh by Norbert Wiener|Human and Machine Time Scales Can Fail to Mesh by Norbert Wiener]] From [[wiki/Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation|Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation]]: The key variable is whether criticism can change an action before its effects become irreversible. > "This means that though machines are theoretically subject to human criticism, such criticism may be ineffective until long after it is relevant." > **— Norbert Wiener**, *1960, “Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation,” Science 131(3410)* [[reminders/AI Control/Human Criticism May Arrive Too Late by Norbert Wiener|Human Criticism May Arrive Too Late by Norbert Wiener]]