Robotics Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 40.
Composition with Lines
(1917) by Piet Mondrian (Courtesy of Collection
Kroller-Muller Museum, Otterlo, the Netherlands)
shown in London in 1968 in the Cybernetic Serendipity exhibition at
the Institute of Contemporary Arts. Also on show at the exhibition were
examples of computer creations in the fields of music, choreography, po-
etry, animated films, architecture and mobiles.
One of the inventors represented at Cybernetic Serendipity was
DesmondHenry,aphilosopheratthewho
also had an interest in and wrote about the logic machines devised by
William Jevons.
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Henry had a life-long passion for all things mechanical. During the
1960s he created a series of three mechanical drawing machines (see
Fig-
ure 41
), powered by one or two servomotors, all constructed from ana-
logue bombsight “computers” that had been used to calculate the ac-
curate release of bombs from aircraft during World War II. Henry had
found the design and workings of these bombsights quite inspirational,
with their arrangement of gears, belts, cams, and differentials,
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and he
called the configurations made by these inner workings “peerless parabo-
las”. The initial inspiration behind the development of his machines was
to capture graphically these peerless parabolas.
Henry's drawing machines were not precision instruments and could
not store information or be pre-programmed, due to the aleatoric el-
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See Chapter 1.
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The bombsight computer was an instrument that formed part of the cockpit of a bomber
aircraft. Into this computer was fed information regarding wind-speed, altitude and wind direction,
from which the computer calculated the accurate release of bombs onto its target from the moving
aircraft. Such predictor systems inspired Norbert Wiener to coin the term “cybernetics” in 1948.
