Cybernetics

Cybernetics, according to the AHD, is a noun meaning:

"The theoretical study of communication and control processes in biological, mechanical, and electronic systems, esp. the comparison of these processes in biological and artificial systems."

Its origins are in the Greek word kubernetes, "governor", from kubernan, meaning "to govern". The relation between its origins and its meaning could be that cybernetics involves control processes, so it is therefore involved in governing. More and more often I run into this word in the form of its shortened prefix "cyber-" or "cyb-" in such words as cyborg, cyberpunk, cyberspace , cybercafe, etc.