Aphorisms Concerning the Interpretation
of Nature and the Kingdom
of Man
Francis Bacon (1561-1626) was a
person of questionable character, at least when it came to politics. While he
was Lord Chancellor of England (the highest judicial officer for Queen Elizabeth I), he was accused to taking bribes and was forced
out of office. This same man, however, is generally regarded as the founder of
modern science; he was one of the first philosophers to argue that science must
become more honest through objective experimentation, and there is no
indication that he was anything but honest when practicing science.
Indeed, one of his last
acts in life was a scientific experiment. In order to determine whether ice
could be used to preserve food, Bacon spent hours
outside collecting snow. From his exposure to the cold weather, he caught a
fatal case of pneumonia. Yet, he still completed his experiment. On his death
bed, he wrote, 'The experiment succeeded, excellently well.'
The following
selections from 'Aphorisms Concerning the Interpretation of Nature and the
Kingdom of Man' (the first book of his Novum Organum) show his concern for
developing an objective approach to science Although Bacon felt that it was crucial
for science to become more objective, he was not, as will be seen, naïve about the difficulty of
achieving absolute objectivity. He despaired of any science in his own day in
part because no one paid any attention to the ways in which the idols strangled
thought, observation, and imagination.
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