W. Ross Ashby

W. Ross Ashby (1903–1972) was a British psychiatrist and a pioneer of cybernetics who spent his career in psychiatric and academic posts in England and the United States, culminating as a professor of biophysics and electrical engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. He is best known for formulating the Law of Requisite Variety, building the homeostat, and co-authoring the Good Regulator theorem with Roger Conant. His books Design for a Brain and An Introduction to Cybernetics are considered foundational texts in the field.