Books, Brochures, and Chapters>Book:  Bacon , Francis (2005-11-30), The Novum Organon, or a True Guide to the Interpretation of Nature, Adamant Media Corporation, Retrieved on 2011-05-17
  • Source Material [www.constitution.org]
  • Folksonomies: todo nature naturalism observation

    Memes

    17 MAY 2011

     We Believe What We Want to Be True

    The human understanding is no dry light, but receives infusion from the will and affections; whence proceed sciences which may be called 'sciences as one would'. For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes. Therefore he rejects difficult things from impatience of research; sober things, because they narrow hope; the deeper things of nature, from superstition; the light of experience, from arrogance and pride; things not commonly believed, out of deference to the opinion of th...
    Folksonomies: nature emotion perception
    Folksonomies: nature emotion perception
      1  notes

    Because of pride, hope, impatience, and a myriad other passions that affect our psyches.

    25 JUL 2011

     If You Wish To Contradict Bacon's Assertions, Please Use ...

    I have on my own part made it my care and study that the things which I shall propound should not only be true, but should also be presented to men's minds, how strangely soever preoccupied and obstructed, in a manner not harsh or unpleasant. It is but reasonable, however (especially in so great a restoration of learning and knowledge), that I should claim of men one favor in return, which is this: if anyone would form an opinion or judgment either out of his own observation, or out of the cr...
      1  notes

    Use experiments, use tests, and observance of nature to formulate your arguments.

    25 JUL 2011

     Man Can Only Know from Observing Nature

    Man, being the servant and interpreter of Nature, can do and understand so much and so much only as he has observed in fact or in thought of the course of nature. Beyond this he neither knows anything nor can do anything.
      1  notes

    We come from nature, are subservient to it, and can only understand our world by observing it.

    25 JUL 2011

     Nature to be commanded must be obeyed

    Human knowledge and human power meet in one; for where the cause is not known the effect cannot be produced. Nature to be commanded must be obeyed; and that which in contemplation is as the cause is in operation as the rule.
    Folksonomies: nature aphorisms
    Folksonomies: nature aphorisms
      1  notes

    where the cause is not known the effect cannot be produced

    25 JUL 2011

     A Man Can Work With Is Nature

    Toward the effecting of works, all that man can do is to put together or put asunder natural bodies. The rest is done by nature working within.
    Folksonomies: nature naturalism
    Folksonomies: nature naturalism
      1  notes

    We work with the components nature gives us, the workings of those components is done by nature.

    25 JUL 2011

     Science Must Continually Renew Itself

    It is idle to expect any great advancement in science from the superinducing and engrafting of new things upon old. We must begin anew from the very foundations, unless we would revolve forever in a circle with mean and contemptible progress.
    Folksonomies: science classics tradition
    Folksonomies: science classics tradition
      1  notes

    Great advancement does not come from perpetually building on old ideas, but by rebuilding the old in a new light of understanding.

    25 JUL 2011

     Francis Bacon Takes Issue With Postmodernism

    The doctrine of those who have denied that certainty could be attained at all has some agreement with my way of proceeding at the first setting out; but they end in being infinitely separated and opposed. For the holders of that doctrine assert simply that nothing can be known. I also assert that not much can be known in nature by the way which is now in use. But then they go on to destroy the authority of the senses and understanding; whereas I proceed to devise and supply helps for the same.
      1  notes

    Bacon attacks postmodernism and the idea that we cannot know anything through the senses, even though postmodernism didn't exist yet.

    25 JUL 2011

     Humans Pay More Attention to Affirmatives, Biased Toward ...

    The human understanding when it has once adopted an opinion (either as being the received opinion or as being agreeable to itself) draws all things else to support and agree with it. And though there be a greater number and weight of instances to be found on the other side, yet these it either neglects and despises, or else by some distinction sets aside and rejects, in order that by this great and pernicious predetermination the authority of its former conclusions may remain inviolate. And t...
    Folksonomies: observation perception bias
    Folksonomies: observation perception bias
      1  notes

    ...it is the peculiar and perpetual error of the human intellect to be more moved and excited by affirmatives than by negatives; whereas it ought properly to hold itself indifferently disposed toward both alike.

    25 JUL 2011

     Aristotle Did Not Work From Experience

    The most conspicuous example of the first class was Aristotle, who corrupted natural philosophy by his logic: fashioning the world out of categories; assigning to the human soul, the noblest of substances, a genus from words of the second intention; doing the business of density and rarity (which is to make bodies of greater or less dimensions, that is, occupy greater or less spaces), by the frigid distinction of act and power; asserting that single bodies have each a single and proper motion...
      1  notes

    ...having first determined the question according to his will, he then resorts to experience, and bending her into conformity with his placets, leads her about like a captive in a procession.

    25 JUL 2011

     The Platonic School Believed Nothing Was Knowable

    A caution must also be given to the understanding against the intemperance which systems of philosophy manifest in giving or withholding assent, because intemperance of this kind seems to establish idols and in some sort to perpetuate them, leaving no way open to reach and dislodge them. This excess is of two kinds: the first being manifest in those who are ready in deciding, and render sciences dogmatic and magisterial; the other in those who deny that we can know anything, and so introduce...
      1  notes

    They believed science and nature were simply shadows, mere reflections of a reality we could never hope to truly know.

    25 JUL 2011

     God Spent a Day on Light, Much Less Time On Fruit

    Now God on the first day of creation created light only, giving to that work an entire day, in which no material substance was created. So must we likewise from experience of every kind first endeavor to discover true causes and axioms; and seek for experiments of Light, not for experiments of Fruit. For axioms rightly discovered and established supply practice with its instruments, not one by one, but in clusters, and draw after them trains and troops of works.
    Folksonomies: principles fundamentals
    Folksonomies: principles fundamentals
      1  notes

    So should we spend time on causes and axioms rather than works.

    25 JUL 2011

     Science Builds Up, Opinion Does Not

    Signs also are to be drawn from the increase and progress of systems and sciences. For what is founded on nature grows and increases, while what is founded on opinion varies but increases not. If therefore those doctrines had not plainly been like a plant torn up from its roots, but had remained attached to the womb of nature and continued to draw nourishment from her, that could never have come to pass which we have seen now for twice a thousand years; namely, that the sciences stand where t...
    Folksonomies: science foundation opinion
    Folksonomies: science foundation opinion
      1  notes

    Ideas rooted in reality may be built upon like a solid foundation of truth, while opinions do no grow upward, but spread out thin and varied.

    25 JUL 2011

     The Greatest Greeks Did Not Set Up Schools

    Now the wisdom of the Greeks was professorial and much given to disputations, a kind of wisdom most adverse to the inquisition of truth. Thus that name of Sophists, which by those who would be thought philosophers was in contempt cast back upon and so transferred to the ancient rhetoricians, Gorgias, Protagoras, Hippias, Polus, does indeed suit the entire class: Plato, Aristotle, Zeno, Epicurus, Theophrastus, and their successors Chrysippus, Carneades, and the rest. There was this difference ...
    Folksonomies: classics greeks
    Folksonomies: classics greeks
      1  notes

    They were too busy doing science to produce useful knowledge than to waste time profiting on their ideas.

    25 JUL 2011

     Time Fertile in Sciences is Scarce in Human History

    For out of the five and twenty centuries over which the memory and learning of men extends, you can hardly pick out six that were fertile in sciences or favorable to their development. In times no less than in regions there are wastes and deserts. For only three revolutions and periods of learning can properly be reckoned: one among the Greeks, the second among the Romans, and the last among us, that is to say, the nations of Western Europe. And to each of these hardly two centuries can justl...
      1  notes

    For out of the five and twenty centuries over which the memory and learning of men extends, you can hardly pick out six that were fertile in sciences or favorable to their development.

    25 JUL 2011

     Most Scientists are Not on the True Scientific Path

    Now the true and lawful goal of the sciences is none other than this: that human life be endowed with new discoveries and powers. But of this the great majority have no feeling, but are merely hireling and professorial; except when it occasionally happens that some workman of acuter wit and covetous of honor applies himself to a new invention, which he mostly does at the expense of his fortunes. But in general, so far are men from proposing to themselves to augment the mass of arts and scienc...
      1  notes

    According to Bacon, the goal of science is to endow humanity with new discoveries and powers, but most scientists are focused on personal gain.

    25 JUL 2011

     The Parable of the Alchemist

    And if again he descend to the consideration of those arts which are deemed curious rather than safe, and look more closely into the works of the alchemists or the magicians, he will be in doubt perhaps whether he ought rather to laugh over them or to weep. For the alchemist nurses eternal hope and when the thing fails, lays the blame upon some error of his own; fearing either that he has not sufficiently understood the words of his art or of his authors (whereupon he turns to tradition and a...
      1  notes

    Alchemists blame themselves when their experiments bare no fruit, but in the effort, they explore the natural world.

    25 JUL 2011

     Fear of Science Toppling God

    Lastly, you will find that by the simpleness of certain divines, access to any philosophy, however pure, is well-nigh closed. Some are weakly afraid lest a deeper search into nature should transgress the permitted limits of sober-mindedness, wrongfully wresting and transferring what is said in Holy Writ against those who pry into sacred mysteries, to the hidden things of nature, which are barred by no prohibition. Others with more subtlety surmise and reflect that if second causes are unknown...
    Folksonomies: science religion
    Folksonomies: science religion
      1  notes

    People fear scientific inquiry because they fear negating the scriptures with their discoveries. A very prescient observation by Francis Bacon.

    25 JUL 2011

     School Kills Scientific Inquiry

    Again, in the customs and institutions of schools, academies, colleges, and similar bodies destined for the abode of learned men and the cultivation of learning, everything is found adverse to the progress of science. For the lectures and exercises there are so ordered that to think or speculate on anything out of the common way can hardly occur to any man. And if one or two have the boldness to use any liberty of judgment, they must undertake the task all by themselves; they can have no adva...
      1  notes

    The structure of curriculum is to set a path and provide no deviation from it, but deviation from the path is the stuff of scientific discovery.

    25 JUL 2011

     The Advances of Science are Prophecized

    Nor should the prophecy of Daniel be forgotten touching the last ages of the world: "Many shall go to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased"; clearly intimating that the thorough passage of the world (which now by so many distant voyages seems to be accomplished, or in course of accomplishment), and the advancement of the sciences, are destined by fate, that is, by Divine Providence, to meet in the same age.
      1  notes

    Daniel predicts the rise of science and knowing in the Bible.

    25 JUL 2011

     Experiments of Light Versus Those of Fruit

    Again, even in the great plenty of mechanical experiments, there is yet a great scarcity of those which are of most use for the information of the understanding. For the mechanic, not troubling himself with the investigation of truth, confines his attention to those things which bear upon his particular work, and will not either raise his mind or stretch out his hand for anything else. But then only will there be good ground of hope for the further advance of knowledge when there shall be rec...
      1  notes

    The experiment of light has the admirable property of never missing or failing, always shining light on the natural world.

    25 JUL 2011

     The Magnet Was An Accidental Discovery

    So again, if, before the discovery of the magnet, anyone had said that a certain instrument had been invented by means of which the quarters and points of the heavens could be taken and distinguished with exactness, men would have been carried by their imagination to a variety of conjectures concerning the more exquisite construction of astronomical instruments; but that anything could be discovered agreeing so well in its movements with the heavenly bodies, and yet not a heavenly body itself...
    Folksonomies: discovery awe luck
    Folksonomies: discovery awe luck
      1  notes

    The idea that a bit of metal could point the way North was inconceivable until its lucky discovery.

    25 JUL 2011

     Take Hope in the Complexity of Nature

    Meantime, let no man be alarmed at the multitude of particulars, but let this rather encourage him to hope. For the particular phenomena of art and nature are but a handful to the inventions of the wit, when disjoined and separated from the evidence of things. Moreover, this road has an issue in the open ground and not far off; the other has no issue at all, but endless entanglement. For men hitherto have made but short stay with experience, but passing her lightly by, have wasted an infinity...
    Folksonomies: wonder discovery experience
    Folksonomies: wonder discovery experience
      1  notes

    While humans have wasted time on meditations and exercises of wit, there is an endless world of experience awaiting them.

    25 JUL 2011

     Focus on Common Things

    And first, for those things which seem common. Let men bear in mind that hitherto they have been accustomed to do no more than refer and adapt the causes of things which rarely happen to such as happen frequently, while of those which happen frequently they never ask the cause, but take them as they are for granted. And therefore they do not investigate the causes of weight, of the rotation of heavenly bodies, of heat, cold, light, hardness, softness, rarity, density, liquidity, solidity, ani...
      1  notes

    We overlook the common in scientific inquiry, but it is in the common occurrences that the laws of nature are to be found.

    25 JUL 2011

     Gains and Loses in Man's Empirical View

    I may hand over to men their fortunes, now their understanding is emancipated and come as it were of age; whence there cannot but follow an improvement in man's estate and an enlargement of his power over nature. For man by the fall fell at the same time from his state of innocency and from his dominion over creation. Both of these losses however can even in this life be in some part repaired; the former by religion and faith, the latter by arts and sciences. For creation was not by the curse...
    Folksonomies: nature empiricism
    Folksonomies: nature empiricism
      1  notes

    Man loses his innocence and dominion over creation, but gains in his estate and power over nature.

    25 JUL 2011

     Be Mindful of Experience

    There remains simple experience which, if taken as it comes, is called accident; if sought for, experiment. But this kind of experience is no better than a broom without its band, as the saying is — a mere groping, as of men in the dark, that feel all round them for the chance of finding their way, when they had much better wait for daylight, or light a candle, and then go. But the true method of experience, on the contrary, first lights the candle, and then by means of the candle shows the w...
      1  notes

    Do not grope around in the dark, but light a candle of scientific understanding before venturing into experiences.

    25 JUL 2011

     Man's Sense is Not the Measure of All Things

    For it is a false assertion that the sense of man is the measure of things. On the contrary, all perceptions as well of the sense as of the mind are according to the measure of the individual and not according to the measure of the universe. And the human understanding is like a false mirror, which, receiving rays irregularly, distorts and discolors the nature of things by mingling its own nature with it.
    Folksonomies: nature perception senses
    Folksonomies: nature perception senses
      1  notes

    ...human understanding is like a false mirror, which, receiving rays irregularly, distorts and discolors the nature of things by mingling its own nature with it.

    25 JUL 2011

     The Centrist Path Between Two Extremes of Knowing

    Those who have taken upon them to lay down the law of nature as a thing already searched out and understood, whether they have spoken in simple assurance or professional affectation, have therein done philosophy and the sciences great injury. For as they have been successful in inducing belief, so they have been effective in quenching and stopping inquiry; and have done more harm by spoiling and putting an end to other men's efforts than good by their own. Those on the other hand who have tak...
      1  notes

    Those who think the laws of nature are figured out and those who think we can know nothing are two erroneous extremes, a balance between acknowledging what we know and its boundaries is important.

    25 JUL 2011

     Parable of the Scientist as Insect

    Those who have handled sciences have been either men of experiment or men of dogmas. The men of experiment are like the ant, they only collect and use; the reasoners resemble spiders, who make cobwebs out of their own substance. But the bee takes a middle course: it gathers its material from the flowers of the garden and of the field, but transforms and digests it by a power of its own. Not unlike this is the true business of philosophy; for it neither relies solely or chiefly on the powers o...
    Folksonomies: science metaphor parable
    Folksonomies: science metaphor parable
      1  notes

    Scientists work like ants, spiders, and bees.

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