During his time, Francis Bacon wanted to overhaul how we thought of knowledge, and in this pursuit, he criticized the supposed knowledge held by natural philosophers as their reasoning and their conclusions were unsupported by the interpretation of nature. In the Novum Organum he criticized his contemporaries saying they took generalities from their experiences and then claimed that they were axioms, and when the evidence against these axioms appeared, instead of coming to a new conclusion, they’d try and shape their axioms around the new evidence to make it work. Here we see what Bacon would call “anticipating nature” which he identifies as one of the two types of inductive reasoning, the second being interpreting nature. Anticipating nature is when particulars that are observed become the final conclusion or hypothesis when they are the direct effect of another phenomenon. The major problem here is that this was the most surface level of observation and did not try to find the underlying reasons or explanation for any natural phenomena, which Bacon believed was the goal of natural philosophy rather than a simple enumeration of the facts to deduce a simple observation (Novum Organum I, viii & xxv). Even when individuals in his time extended particulars into universals and went beyond the simple enumeration, they often had the facts themselves wrong and thus their hypotheses were incorrect. Though occasionally theories coming from the anticipation of nature did get things right, to Bacon this was merely good fortune, rather than a product of good science (Masculine Birth of Time, 71).
This was the old logic of the day that Bacon wanted to get rid of, he proposed instead a new logic based primarily on the interpretation of nature. This interpretation of nature needed the axioms which it concluded to be “larger and wider” than the particulars from which it is drawn, which only makes sense as that would be the only way to adequately explain the cause-and-effect relationship between the general theory and its effects in what we see in nature. Axioms or theories in this way would also allow us to predict natural phenomena which could then be verified as further evidence for the theory. This theory can go beyond the simple enumeration Bacon detested because it allows for true induction, going beyond simply what is seen without jumping to pure conjecture, and through this, he believes we can reach certain conclusions through the use of his Baconian method. First, we come to a hypothesis derived through a true interpretation of natural facts and phenomena. Then, this hypothesis becomes tested by experimentation to determine whether it can predict natural phenomena beyond what was used for its formulation. Through experimentation, we can also rule out alternative explanations and hypotheses until we are left with the conclusion that the one hypothesis is certain and becomes the running theoretical explanation for the phenomenon (De Augmentis Scientiarum 5ii, 410).
The interesting thing about Bacon’s method is that he did not think it to be decisive, conclusive, or infallible in any regard. Though he wanted to create certainty in conclusions he understood that there was no way to truly prove his theory of knowledge without reliance on circular reasoning and his certainty was no more than the highest degree of confidence possible. More than anything Bacon was concerned with disrupting the old ways of thinking that had led humanity astray for so long. In many ways he had an epistemological project in mind similar to Descartes in throwing away all prejudices and starting from nothing, however, he was less concerned with what was actually true and more with the way in which new knowledge was acquired. To see this we just have to look at Bacon’s view of the Idols, the various prejudices and ideas he believed corrupted the human mind and prevented us from attaining well-reasoned conclusions and knowledge. These idols are the Idols of the Tribe, the Idols of the Cave, the Idols of the Marketplace, and the Idols of the Theater. The Idols of the Tribe are that of our skewed perception of things and errors of the senses. The Idols of the Cave come from the errors of our particular natures, including our beliefs and experiences distorting knowledge. The Idols of the Marketplace come from the errors in our language and use of words that are prone to causing confusion. Finally are the Idols of the Theater, which are the dogmatic beliefs of science and philosophy that we hold to be true and immutable, and are to Bacon no more real than a play. Though Bacon does not purport his method to be the best by any means, he does believe it does well in ridding ourselves of these errors so that our knowledge isn’t distorted. If we reject unfounded preconceived notions and follow Bacon’s method, we are not prone to these errors as we allow no room for our natures, the confusion of language, or the previous dogmas, we only conclude that which comes about through observation, experimentation, and well-informed reason.
Bacon believes that speculative natural philosophy is to be concerned with the nature of causes. Using Aristotelean causes, he believes that physics should be about the material and efficient causes and metaphysics should be about formal and final causes. And although he believes that metaphysics is important to inquire about, we must realize that we cannot discover metaphysical principles through the same interpretation of nature. Final causes are also not supposed to be in the realm of natural philosophy period, and Bacon believes that this is one of the Idols of the Theater, which was not a popular view in his day. He also rejected the idea that theology can be mixed with natural philosophy or be the explanation of material and efficient causes, another unpopular view in his time, with Descartes using God as the explanation of efficient causes.
Although Bacon’s views upset the paradigm of natural philosophy at the time, they came to be widely accepted and influential after his death for their ability to properly ground knowledge in the physical world. His views did not make him right about everything either, but he was well ahead of many of his contemporaries in various ideas, such as believing in atomism through the use of his inductive method. His theories and method laid the foundation for all natural philosophy to come and experimental philosophy altogether.
Bacon, Francis. Novum Organum. Edited by Robert Leslie Ellis and James Spedding. Routledge, 1900.
Bacon, Francis. The Works. Edited by Robert Leslie Ellis, Douglas Denon Heath, and James Spedding. 15 vols. London, 1857.
Bacon, Francis. The Works. Edited by James Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, Douglas Denon Heath, and William Rawley. 15 vols. Boston: Taggard & Thompson, 1861. Francis Bacon.
Bacon, Francis. The Works. Edited by J. Spedding, R. L. Ellis, and D. D. Heath. 7 vols., 1889.