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Write for five minutes without stopping:
How does the author...
use the
1.2.3. approach:
- 1. this is what I said.
- 2. this is why it is important.
- 3. this is what I said because of its importance remember the lesson.
How often we find, in a small thing, the reflection of the universe itself which evokes a response from you.
Background
“The Four Idols”
by
Francis Bacon
(1620, Novum Organum)
four fatal flaws or fancies due to common, personal, social & dogmatic features of human character
“truth is to be sought for not in the felicity of any age, which is an unstable thing, but in the light of nature and experience, which is eternal.”
Contemplation of nature and of bodies in their simple form break and distract the understanding… overpower and dissolve understanding:”
Leucippus Vs. Democritus
particles to the lost in the eidola (ideal)
exclusion of structure admiration of the structure
atoms in a void excluding the simplicity of nature
“ idols of the Cave… education. , habit, and accident”
“have most effect in disturbing the clearness of the understanding.… ideas” to which we of convenience have become habituated or “partial”
“let every student of nature take this as a rule,-- that whatever the mind seizes and dwells upon with peculiar satisfaction is to be held in suspicion and so much the more care is to be taken”
“idols of the marketplace: … . lead men away in numberless empty controversies or idle fancies.”
“But the idols of the marketplace are most troublesome of all idols which have crept into the understanding through the alliances of words and names.”
“an understanding of greater acuteness”
replace the conventional wisdom of any peculiar period (zeitgeist)
“a more diligent observation would alter those lines to suit the true divisions of nature
-- might dispel --
“words stand in the way and resist the change.”
F. B. blames:
philosophical narrowness (excluded experimentation & observation under the scrutiny of logic)
Plato & neo-platonists
superstition
theological bent (untamed, unexamined , uncritical exegesis of sacred & transcendent meaning)
“the corruption of philosophy by superstition and an admixture of theology is far more widely spread.”
“abstract forms of first and final causes” (Aristotle’s 4 causes: immediate, efficient, formal, & final)
> “there is taken… a great deal out of a few things, or a very little out of many things.”
Idols of the Theater
“movement of souls”
“Pythagoras…, Plato and his school.”
identified with “cumbrous superstition”
“entrance into the kingdom of man.”
is blocked by
obstacles which are four idols
1 class: Idols of the Tribe --“have their foundation in human nature itself”
2 “ Idols of the Cave -- “common errors” of the individual’s nature
3 “ Idols of the Marketplace -- “arise from consort, intercourse, commerce”
4 “ Idols of the Theater -- “dogmatic belief” in sensory illusions
metaphorically preconceived attitudes are engendered from experiences of the:
Tribe --– ethnicity
“a false assertion that the sense of man is the measure of all things.”
“measure of the individual” takes mistaken priority over “the measure of the universe.”
familial values, sanguinary obligations, common character flaws: “shared …human nature.”
Cave ––– egocentricity
“everyone has a cave or den of his own, which refracts and discolors the light of nature.”
character
education
“authority of whom he esteems and admires.”
“the spirit of a man” … “full of perturbations, and governed as it were by chance”
personal perspective narrows and ignores the wider “common world” ; troglodyte (cave dweller)
individual hubris, specific character flaws, lack of experience, breadth and exposure.
Marketplace –– social activity
“formed by the intercourse and association of men with each other… for it is by discourse that men associate, and words are imposed.” (false certainty)
too great a dependence on language creating shared illusions, ideas with a currency all their own.
Theater –– dogmatism
“All the received systems [of thought -- schools of authorities] are but stage plays -- representing worlds of their own creation after an unreal scenic fashion.”
“system now in vogue” conventionally widespread beliefs (false breadth)
“or only of the ancients sects and philosophies” customary views (false longevity)
“which by tradition, credulity, and negligence, have come to be received.” ( false depth)
• § •
collective impact on thought:
“The human understanding when it has once adopted an opinion draws all things else to support and agree with it.”
“neglects and despises… sets aside and rejects”
Restatement of four obstacles to clear thinking:
1 prejudice -- for the anecdotal, personal, idiosyncratic, narrow or provincial views
2 myopia -- tunnel vision, widespread delusions, common habits of belief & distortion
3 rhetoric -- language distorts by the very description of those things described
4 deception -- traditions of authority based on age, impression, credulousness, or negligence.
A new form of learning is required for the modern world that is practical, accurate, and reliable.
Francis Bacon
1561-1626
Trinity College, Cambridge University
Elizabethan & Jacobethan Renaissance materialist writer, historian, and jurist,
who rejected the Platonic & Aristotelian traditions of antiquity.
English solicitor, Member of Parliament, Knight, statesmen, writer, convicted criminal (bribery) advocated a moderate Irish Policy ( as opposed toe Henry & Elizabeth’s invasions)
he published between 1597 & 1625
§ § §
Significant dates:
1584-
1595 Member of the House of Commons
mediator between the court of Queen Elizabeth & Parliament
1603 advocated and masterminded the legal unification of England & Scotland
Knighted & made commissioner of the Union of England & Scotland
1605 Advancement of Learning for James 1st
1607 named Solicitor General
1613 appointed Attorney General
1617 Privy Councilor
1618 Lord Chancellor of United England & Scotland
1619 became a peer of the realm: Baron Verulam.
1620 Novum Organum…Interpretations of Nature ; about facts of natural history
1621 raised to Viscount St. Albans.
1621 Charged, tried, and convicted by Parliament of taking bribes ; fined £40,000
Sept. 1621 pardoned by James 1
1622 The New Atlantis promoted “scientific academies” for advancement of society
believed that:
common modes of thought; idiosyncratic errors, too great a dependence on language to convey truth, and the dead hand of tradition frequently hampered the human acquisition of knowledge and hindered the collective understanding of nature.
Nature had to be understood and copied in order to be mastered.
Inductive method of logic to discern errors in understanding nature
“ampliative inference”
infer by means of an analogy from the characteristics or properties of a single datum, the characteristics and properties of the larger group to which that datum belonged -- leaving to later experience the correction of evident errors.
established the reputation of unbiased, accurate observation in the sciences.
Definitions:
Dates:
Data:
Argument
Conclusion
Lesson
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