Project Cybersyn

The fact it could have worked probably weighted in the decision to sponsor the coup and the regime that destroyed its legacy.

A real shame.

I have personally not listened to it but there's a recent podcast that covers this story and I've heard it's really good, it's called "The Santiago Boys" it's referenced in the article.

I stumbled on Brain of the Firm by Stafford Beer as a freshman in college, and loved the idea of an auto-optimizing business.

Back then I had questions about exactly how such a system could be implemented, the algorithm was very hand wavey, but I assumed surely they must’ve figured it out before writing a book about it.

As an adult with 20 years extra experience, I’m fairly confident that, no, aside from the high level concept, they had no idea how to build such a system. That coup was probably the best possible outcome for Beer - it gave credibility to his ideas without actually testing them.