Wallace (1858), (...) described evolution as a negative feedback process. - origin of “feedback”

Wallace (1858), whose letter to Darwin caused publication of Origin of Species[25],

described evolution as a negative feedback process. In the penultimate paragraph of

the paper to the Linnean Society Wallace states:

"The action of this principle is exactly like that of the centrifugal governor of the steam engine,

which checks and corrects any irregularities almost before they become evident; and in like

manner no unbalanced deficiency in the animal kingdom can ever reach any conspicuous

magnitude, because it would make itself felt at the very first step, by rendering existence

difficult and extinction almost sure soon to follow."

In his paper the frequent use of the term variety as in “variety of species” and, as above,

the term “unbalanced deficiency” (as extinction producing violation of homeostasis) are

striking to the cybernetician. Bateson (1976) calls this “probably the most powerful

thing that’d been said in the 19th Century”.

Ten years later Maxwell (1868) wrote “On Governors” but the discussion is

restricted to Watt, Jenkin, Thomson, Foucault and Siemens who all produced

centrifugal regulatory devices. Maxwell seemed unaware of Wallace’s claims for the

centrifugal governor, unifying electricity, magnetism and light was achievement

enough, after all. Nowadays we speak of negative feedback. The term was not used

until 1927 when Dr Harold Black[26] used a phase shifting loop back, patented in 1937,

to cancel amplifier valve noise for the American Bell transcontinental telephone

system.