Francis Bacon's book, The New Organon, analyzed errors in the natural philosophy of the early 17th century and laid out the framework of modern science.

Francis Bacon was born in 1561 to a leading family in England. He rose steadily up the bureaucratic ranks of English government until he was impeached for bribery and forced out of public service. In 1620 Bacon published The New Organon (Greek for tool or instrument). The Organon is a multi-part treatise that records the errors of scientific methodology up to Bacon’s time and recommends a new way of interrogating nature. This new method would change the way science is approached, arguably being the single largest factor in the technological explosion of the modern era.

Francis Bacon and the Idols

In the first part of Organon, Bacon looks at the failings of the Aristotelian model of natural philosophy. In his critique, Bacon identifies four failings of human intellect that prevent “the old organon” from providing a true understanding of natural phenomena. He calls these failings “idols” in that people become almost religiously attached to them.

Idols of the Tribe

People have a natural tendency to put everything into human sense or emotion terms. But, Bacon finds several problems with this idol. First it causes people to fail to understand things that can’t be directly sensed (e.g. the nature of air that cannot be seen). Also, human senses frequently deceive the owner making them an unreliable instrument. Emotion on the other hand hinders the way data is interpreted, rejecting that which causes discomfort or failing to look for a solution if the problem appears difficult.

Idols of the Cave

Through both nature and nurture humans come to have certain personal preconceived notions of how things “should” be. It is these prejudices that prevent people from seeing how things really are. Therefore when evidence is presented to the contrary of these notions, people go through a form of cognitive dissonance and either ignore the evidence or attempt to shoehorn it in to their model.

Idols of the Market Place

People exchange ideas using language. However most common words and many scientific terms of Bacon’s time were too imprecise to be used to describe nature. When using words such as “wet” or “heavy” there is no reason to believe that the subjective understanding of one person will be any where near that of another.

Idols of the Theatre

These misinterpretations result from the attachment to established dogmas, schools of philosophy or superstitions. These idols have been repeated so many times at so many places that they are considered unquestioned truths. In reality none have them thoroughly tested against empirical evidence and most would fail if they were tested.

Bacon also points out some of the other more common logical fallacies people gravitate to when investigating nature including confusing correlation with cause, counting hits and ignoring misses and failure to account for coincidence when analyzing results.

Bacon’s Scientific Method

Bacon then makes recommendations to exorcise these idols. Some of the key concepts he stresses are highlighted below.

Go into an investigation with no expectations of how it will turn out.

Wherever possible measure and quantify results.

Use written records to analyze observations and to collaborate with others.

Be slow to go from specific experimental results to general theories about nature.

Do not attempt to assign intentional purpose to anything other than the actions of man.

If good evidence doesn’t validate the theory, dump the theory and work on a different explanation.

Bacon wrote that his methods weren’t just intended for science. They could be used for other knowledge arts as well. He was also confident that his way of inquiring would soon be the standard and that human knowledge would rapidly increase because of it. And although he never got to see his predictions validated – he died in 1626 – his methodology would transform what was natural philosophy into what is today modern science.

Sources:

Bacon, Francis. The New Organon. Lisa Jardine and Michael Silverthorne Eds. NY: Cambridge University Press. 2000.

Muntersbjorn, Madeline M. “Francis Bacon's Philosophy of Science: Machina intellectus and Forma indita.” Philosophy of Science. Dec 2003, 1137 (12).