Our modern artificial intelligence (AI) is an off-shoot, linguistically and functionally, of a broader effort towards understanding and mechanizing the mind and its functions. From its science fiction origins in 1951 to the broader use to describe both symbolic approaches to 'thinking machines' and machine learning connectionism after its adoption at the Dartmouth AI workshop in 1956, AI has become a catch all in name, but not always substance. We'll look back at the phenomenological roots of Norbert Wiener's teleology first developed while studying under William James and Edmund Husserl and trace the evolution of Warren McCulloch's first artificial neural net from some of these same sources. We'll visit the transition of this new science from the 'Teleological Society' at Princeton in 1945 to the adoption of André-Marie Ampère's cybernétique, unearthing some lesser-known details along the way. We'll track the evolution of what then became cybernetics through the Macy Conferences and Ratio Club. Finally, we'll take a closer look at the emergence of AI, the Balkanization of prior interdisciplinary efforts after Dartmouth, and track where some of these aspects sit today. The goal will be to better understand the history, including many lost elements, enabling us to consider how and where the past may help us create a better future.