SR+-+Francis+Bacon

= = **Sir Francis Bacon**

= By Kristy Evans, Lori Hillegass, and Katrina Bohnhorst Biography: = Born: January 22, 1561 in London, England Died: April 9, 1626 in Highgate, England

Sir Francis Bacon was an Englishman who was educated at Cambridge in law and science. During Queen Elizabeth I's reign, he rose as a lawyer. He was knighted in 1603. In 1618, King James I honored Bacon as chancellor. Seven of his thirty works on philosophy were published. Bacon was an avid politician with his first election to parliament in 1584. His "new philosophy" rejects Aristotle's classification of independent sciences with its several segregating axioms. His primary task of science was the discovery of forms, the components of forms, and the causes within the particular of nature. All natural causes are material causes; there are no final causes of nature. His belief on the new method was "the commerce of the mind within things." Science was experimental with noting how human activity alters the world, not just from what individuals accomplish. In 1620, Bacon published the New Method which was the plan for the renewal of the sciences. It contained six parts: survey of existing knowledge, inductive logic, an encyclopedia of all natural phenomena, examples of the New Method's application, discoveries, and an exposition of the new philosophy that would finally emerge. In 1621, he was convicted in the high court of parliament for accepting bribes. He was later sentenced to a fine, imprisonment, and was banned from office and parliament. During this time period, Bacon was capable to really expand his scientific writing from his previous political writing. Bacon urged his contemporaries to have confidence in their own abilities and see change as desirable.

=Analysis of Works: = "I Have Made a Beginning of the Work": Novum Organum (1620)

Sir Francis Bacon has embarked on a journey to discover new ideas and opinions about life Bacon states that one must depend on experiments over instruments in order to combine empirical and rational faculty. Experiments are the sold thing that can answer questions with instruments providing a mere aid. Bacon issues the precedent for society to diverge from traditions, to branch off into new opinions, and to perform experiments to support one's theory. As the father of scientific empiricism, he embraces the Phenomena of the Universe as a guide to learn and discover on one's own. Men must examine nature to receive the most from it. Human knowledge and human power meet to ultimately gain the most from life.

The Advancement of Learning (1605)

In this document, Bacon speaks about the different fears and concerns that people possess. Some are afraid of learning the deeper meanings of certain things because some do not want to learn about the mysteries within nature. Others choose not to because then it is easier for others to attribute such things to becoming works of God. People are afraid to move forward and ask questions because people think it is an attack against religion. Bacon argues that these fears have no foundation because people need to ask questions and attempt to encounter the deeper context in certain ideas to flourish one's faith and help nourish it. = Key Quotes: = "I Have Made a Beginning of the Work": Novum Organum (1620)

"Those who aspire not to guess and divine, but to discover and know; who propose not to devise mimic and fabulous worlds of there own, but to examine and dissect the nature of this very world itself" (37).

The Advancement of Learning (1605)

 "But if the matter be truly considered, natural philosophy is, after the word of God, at once the surest medicine against superstition and the most approved nourishment for faith..." (37).