Francis Bacon: biography, philosophical teaching. Francis bacon and his main ideas

BACON, FRANCIS(Bacon, Francis) (1561-1626), Baron of Verulam, Viscount of St. Albans, English statesman, essayist and philosopher. Born in London on January 22, 1561, was the youngest son of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal. He studied at Trinity College, Cambridge University for two years, then spent three years in France in the retinue of the British ambassador.

After the death of his father in 1579, he was left practically without a livelihood and entered to study law at the Graze Inn Barristers' School. In 1582 he became a barrister, and in 1584 a member of parliament and until 1614 played a prominent role in debates at sessions of the House of Commons. From time to time he drafted letters to Queen Elizabeth, in which he sought to impartially approach pressing political issues; perhaps if the queen had followed his advice, some conflicts between the crown and parliament could have been avoided. However, his ability as a statesman did not help his career, partly because Lord Burleigh saw Bacon as a rival to his son, partly because he lost the favor of Elizabeth, courageously opposing, for reasons of principle, the adoption of a subsidy bill for coverage of expenses incurred in the war with Spain (1593).

Around 1591, he became an advisor to the Queen's favorite, the Earl of Essex, who offered him a generous reward. However, Bacon made it clear to his patron that he was devoted primarily to his country, and when in 1601 Essex tried to organize a coup, Bacon, being QC, took part in his conviction as a treason. Under Elizabeth, Bacon never rose to any high posts, but after Jacob I Stewart ascended the throne in 1603, he quickly promoted. In 1607 he took the post of solicitor general, in 1613 - attorney general, in 1617 - Lord Keeper of the Great Seal, and in 1618 received the post of Lord Chancellor, the highest in the structure of the judiciary. In 1603 Bacon was awarded the title of knight, he was elevated to the title of Baron of Verulam in 1618 and Viscount of St Albans in 1621. In the same year he was accused of accepting bribes. Bacon acknowledged receiving gifts from people in court, but denied that this had influenced his decision in any way. Bacon was stripped of all posts and banned from appearing at court. He spent the years remaining before his death in seclusion.

The main literary creation of Bacon is considered Experiments (Essayes), on which he worked continuously for 28 years; ten essays were published in 1597, and by 1625 the book had already collected 58 essays, some of which were published in the third edition in a revised form ( Experiments, or moral and political instructions, The Essayes or Counsels, Civill and Morall). Style Experiments laconic and edifying, replete with learned examples and brilliant metaphors. Bacon called his experiments "fragmentary reflections" about ambition, close associates and friends, about love, wealth, about pursuing science, about honors and fame, about the vicissitudes of things and other aspects of human life. In them you can find cold calculation, which is not mixed with emotions or impractical idealism, advice to those who are making a career. There are, for example, such aphorisms: "Everyone who rises high pass along the zigzags of a spiral staircase" and "The wife and children are hostages of fate, because the family is an obstacle to the accomplishment of great deeds, both good and bad." Bacon's treatise About the wisdom of the ancients (De Sapientia Veterum 1609) is an allegorical interpretation of the hidden truths contained in ancient myths. His History of the reign of Henry VII (Historie of the Raigne of King Henry the Seventh 1622) is distinguished by lively characteristics and clear political analysis.

Despite Bacon's pursuits in politics and jurisprudence, philosophy and science were the main business of his life, and he majestically proclaimed: "All knowledge is the area of my concern." Aristotelian deduction, which at that time occupied the dominant position, he rejected as an unsatisfactory way of philosophizing. In his opinion, a new tool of thinking should be proposed, a “new organon”, with the help of which it would be possible to restore human knowledge on a more reliable basis. A general outline of the "great plan for the restoration of the sciences" was made by Bacon in 1620 in the preface to the work. The New Organon, or True Instructions for the Interpretation of Nature (Novum Organum)... This work consisted of six parts: an overview state of the art sciences, description of a new method of obtaining true knowledge, a set of empirical data, a discussion of issues for further research, preliminary decisions and, finally, philosophy itself. Bacon only managed to sketch out the first two parts. The first was named On the benefits and success of knowledge (Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning, Divine and Humane, 1605), the Latin version of which, On the dignity and growth of sciences (De Dignitate et Augmentis Scientiarum, 1623), came out with corrections and many additions. According to Bacon, there are four kinds of "idols" that besiege the minds of people. The first type is the idols of the clan (mistakes that a person makes by virtue of his very nature). The second type is cave idols (errors due to prejudice). The third type is the idols of the square (errors caused by inaccuracies in the use of the language). The fourth type is the idols of the theater (mistakes made due to the adoption of various philosophical systems). Describing the current prejudices that hinder the development of science, Bacon proposed a three-part division of knowledge, produced according to mental functions, and related history to memory, poetry to imagination, and philosophy (in which he included science) to reason. He also gave an overview of the boundaries and nature of human cognition in each of these categories and pointed out important areas of research that have been neglected so far. In the second part of the book, Bacon described the principles of the inductive method, with the help of which he proposed to overthrow all the idols of reason.

In an unfinished story New atlantis (The new Atlantis, written in 1614, publ. 1627) Bacon describes a utopian community of scientists collecting and analyzing data of all kinds according to the outline of the third part of the great plan of restoration. New Atlantis is an excellent social and cultural system that exists on the island of Bensalem, lost somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. The religion of the Atlanteans is Christianity, miraculously open to residents islands; the unit of society is a highly revered family; type of government is essentially a monarchy. The main institution of the state is Solomon's House, the College of the Six Days of Creation, the research center from which scientific discoveries and inventions that ensure the happiness and prosperity of citizens. It is sometimes believed that it was the Solomon House that served as the prototype of the Royal Society of London, established during the reign of Charles II in 1662.

Bacon's struggle against authorities and the method of "logical distinctions", the advancement of a new method of cognition and the conviction that research should begin with observations, and not with theories, put him on a par with the most important representatives of scientific thought of the modern era. However, he did not receive any significant results - neither in empirical research, nor in the field of theory, and his method of inductive cognition through exceptions, which, he believed, would produce new knowledge "like a machine", did not receive recognition in experimental science ...

In March 1626, deciding to check to what extent the cold slows down the process of decay, he experimented with a chicken, stuffing it with snow, but caught a cold. Bacon died at Highgate near London on April 9, 1626.

BACON(Bacon) Francis (January 22, 1561, London - April 9, 1626, Highgate) - English philosopher, writer and statesman, one of the founders of modern philosophy. Born into the family of a high-ranking dignitary of the Elizabethan court, Lord Guardian of the Great Royal Seal. Studied at Trinity College, Cambridge (1573–76) and the Grace Inn Law Corporation (1579–82). In 1586 he became the foreman of this corporation. Conducted extensive judicial practice and was elected to parliament. He began to occupy high government positions under James I Stuart. Since 1618 - Lord High Chancellor and Peer of England. In 1621 he was removed from this post in connection with the charges of abuse and bribery brought against him by the parliament. The last years of his life he was engaged exclusively in scientific and literary activities. He died of a cold, which he received while doing an experiment with freezing a chicken, in order to see how much snow can protect the meat from spoilage.

Bacon's philosophy, ideologically prepared by the preceding natural philosophy, the tradition of English nominalism and the achievements of new natural science, combined a naturalistic worldview with the principles of the analytical method, empiricism with a broad program of reform of the entire intellectual world. Bacon linked the future of mankind, its power and prosperity with the success of sciences in the knowledge of nature and its laws and the implementation of useful inventions on this basis.

The state and improvement of science became the subject of his main philosophical work "The Great Restoration of Sciences" (Instauratio Magna Scientiarum). The first part of it was the treatise "On the Dignity and Augmentation of Sciences" (1623, Russian translation, 1971), containing an encyclopedic review and classification of all human knowledge. All knowledge Bacon divides into three areas, corresponding to the three spiritual abilities of a person: memory, fantasy and reason. Memory corresponds to history, fantasy - poetry, reason - philosophy, which he identifies with science in general, i.e. includes the entire set of explanatory sciences. Further grouping of sciences within these areas is carried out according to the difference in the subjects of their research. This classification, very ramified and detailed, is remarkable in that for each theoretical science Bacon indicates either existing or possible practical or technical discipline corresponding to it, while noting those problems that, in his opinion, need to be worked out. The second part consisted of the treatise New Organon, or True Instructions for the Interpretation of Nature (1620; Russian translation, 1935). This part is the philosophical and methodological focus of the entire Baconian concept. It sets out in detail the doctrine of the method of cognition, the concept of induction as a method of rational analysis and generalization of experimental data, which should radically improve all scientific research and give them a clear perspective. The third part was supposed to represent a cycle of works concerning the "natural and experimental history" of individual phenomena and processes of nature. This plan Bacon fulfilled in half: "History of the winds" (Historia ventorum, 1622), "History of life and death" (Historia vitae et mortis, 1623), "History of the dense and rarefied and about the contraction and expansion of matter in space" (Historia densi et rari ... 1658). The next three parts remained only in the project.

Bacon also speaks of the benefits of scientific and technological development in the story "New Atlantis" (1627, Russian translation, 1821, 1962). Like many of his works, it remained unfinished. The story describes the utopian state of the island of Bensalem, whose main institution is the scholarly order "House of Solomon", the scientific and technical center of the country, which at the same time controls the entire economic life. There are remarkable foresights in the story of the work of the order. This is the idea differentiated organization scientific work with the specialization and division of labor of scientists, with the allocation of various categories of scientific workers, each of which solves a strictly defined range of problems, this is also an indication of the possibility of such technical achievements as the transmission of light over long distances, powerful artificial magnets, aircraft various designs, submarines, obtaining temperatures close to the sun, creating an artificial climate and models that imitate the behavior of animals and people.

Another work to which Bacon constantly turned, replenishing his with new essays, was Experiments, or Instructions, Moral and Political (1597, 1612, 1625, Russian translation 1874, 1962). Experiences contain a wide range of views on a wide variety of vital issues, maxims of practical morality, considerations on political, social and religious topics. Bacon is devoted to the Tudor ideal of the military, maritime, and political might of the nation-state. He examines the conditions for the stability and success of absolutist rule as an arbiter between various social forces; he gives recommendations to the monarch how to suppress the old tribal know, how to create a counterbalance to it in the new nobility, what tax policy to support the merchants, what measures to prevent discontent in the country and cope with popular unrest and revolts. And at the same time, in the interests of the middle class, it advocates the maintenance of trade and a favorable trade balance, for the regulation of prices and the limitation of luxury, for the encouragement of manufactories and the improvement of agriculture. And although much can be learned from the "Experiments" about the philosophical, ethical and socio-political views of Bacon, they belong to philosophy no more than to English literature. Their language and style are fictional. They contain expressive sketches from a whole exhibition of characters, morals, feelings and inclinations of people, revealing in their author a subtle psychologist, an expert on human souls, a picky and objective judge of actions.

In addition to "Experiments" and works related to the development of ideas for the "Great Restoration of Sciences", Bacon owns: an unfinished treatise "On the beginnings and origins in accordance with the myth of Cupid and the sky, or the philosophy of Parmenides and Telesio, and especially Democritus in connection with the myth of Cupid ”(1658, Russian translation, 1937), in which Bacon expressed his approving attitude towards the preceding natural philosophy, especially its understanding of matter as an active principle; Sat. On the Wisdom of the Ancients (1609, Russian translation, 1972), where he gave an allegorical interpretation of ancient myths in the spirit of his natural, moral and political philosophy; The History of the Reign of King Henry VII (1622, Russian translation 1990); a number of legal, political and theological works.

Baconian philosophy developed in the atmosphere of the scientific and cultural upsurge of the late Renaissance and influenced an entire era of subsequent philosophical development. Despite the unexplored elements of scholastic metaphysics and an incorrect assessment of some scientific ideas and discoveries (primarily of Copernicus), Bacon vividly expressed the aspirations of the new science. From him originated the materialist tradition in the philosophy of modern times and the direction of research, which later received the name "philosophy of science", and the utopian "House of Solomon" became in some way the prototype of European scientific societies and academies.

Compositions:

1. The Works. Collected and edited by J.Spedding, R.L. Ellis and D.D. Heath, v. 1-14. L., 1857–74;

2.in Russian. per .: Works, v. 1–2. M., 1977–78.

Literature:

1. Macaulay. Lord Bacon. - Full. collection cit., t. 3. SPb., 1862;

2. Liebig Yu. F. Bacon Verulamsky and the method of natural science. SPb., 1866;

3. Fisher K. Real philosophy and its age. Francis Bacon of Verulam. SPb., 1870;

4. Gorodenskiy N. Francis Bacon, his doctrine of method and an encyclopedia of sciences. Sergiev Posad, 1915;

5. Subbotnik S.F. F. Bacon. M., 1937;

6. Lunacharsky A.V. Francis Bacon. - Collected. cit., t. 6. M., 1965;

7. Asmus V.F. Francis Bacon. - He's the same. Fav. philosopher, works, t. 1, M., 1969;

8. A.L. Subbotin Francis Bacon. M., 1974;

9. Mikhalenko Yu.P. Francis Bacon and his teachings. M., 1975;

10. Adam Ch. Philosophie de François Bacon. P., 1890;

11. Broad C.D. The Philosophy of Francis Bacon. Cambr. 1926;

12. Frost W. Bacon und die Naturphilosophie ... Münch., 1927;

13. Sturt M. Francis Bacon. L., 1932;

14. Farrington B. Francis Bacon: Philosopher of Industrial Science. N.Y., 1949;

15. Idem. The Philosophy of Francis Bacon. Chi., 1966;

16. Anderson F.H. Francis Bacon. His Career and His Thought. Los Ang., 1962.

ru.wikipedia.org

Biography

In 1584 he was elected to parliament. Since 1617, Lord Keeper of the Seal, then - Lord Chancellor; Baron of Verulam and Viscount of St. Albans. In 1621 he was brought to trial on charges of bribery, convicted and removed from all posts. Later he was pardoned by the king, but did not return to public service and devoted the last years of his life to scientific and literary work.

He began his professional career as a lawyer, but later became widely known as a philosopher lawyer and advocate of the scientific revolution. His works are the foundation and popularization of inductive methodology. scientific research, often called the Bacon method. Induction receives knowledge from the outside world through experiment, observation and hypothesis testing. In the context of their time, such methods were used by alchemists. Bacon outlined his approach to the problems of science in the treatise "New Organon", published in 1620. In this treatise, he proclaimed the goal of science to increase the power of man over nature, which he defined as soulless material, the purpose of which is to be used by man, which prompted the barbaric use of the environment.

Scientific knowledge

On the whole, Bacon considered the great merit of science to be almost self-evident and expressed this in his famous aphorism "Knowledge is power."

However, many attacks have been made on science. After analyzing them, Bacon came to the conclusion that God did not forbid the knowledge of nature, as, for example, some theologians claim [source not specified 108 days]. On the contrary, He gave man a mind that longs for the knowledge of the Universe. People only need to understand that there are two types of knowledge: 1) knowledge of good and evil, 2) knowledge of things created by God.

The knowledge of good and evil is forbidden to people. God gives it to them through the Bible. And a person, on the contrary, must cognize created things with the help of his mind. This means that science should occupy a worthy place in the "kingdom of man." The purpose of science is to increase the strength and power of people, to provide them with a rich and dignified life.

Method of cognition

Pointing to the deplorable state of science, Bacon said that so far discoveries have been made by chance, not methodically. There would be many more if the researchers were armed the right method... Method is the path, the main means of research. Even a lame man walking on the road will outrun a normal person running off-road.

The research method developed by Francis Bacon is an early precursor to the scientific method. The method was proposed in Bacon's Novum Organum (New Organon) and was intended to replace the methods proposed in Aristotle's Organum almost 2 millennia ago.

At the heart of scientific knowledge, according to Bacon, induction and experiment should lie.

Induction can be complete (perfect) and incomplete. Full induction means the regular recurrence and exhaustion of any property of the object in the experience under consideration. Inductive generalizations proceed from the assumption that this will be the case in all similar cases. In this garden, all lilacs are white - a conclusion from annual observations during its flowering period.

Incomplete induction includes generalizations made on the basis of the study of not all cases, but only some (conclusion by analogy), because, as a rule, the number of all cases is practically immeasurable, and theoretically it is impossible to prove an infinite number of them: all swans are white for us reliably as long as we will not see a black individual. This conclusion is always probable.

Trying to create "true induction", Bacon sought not only facts confirming a certain conclusion, but also facts refuting it. Thus, he armed natural science with two means of research: enumeration and exclusion. And it is the exceptions that matter most. Using his method, for example, he established that the "form" of heat is the movement of the smallest particles of the body.

So, in his theory of knowledge, Bacon rigorously carried out the idea that true knowledge follows from experience. This philosophical position is called empiricism. Bacon was not only its founder, but also the most consistent empiricist.

Obstacles on the path of knowledge

Francis Bacon divided the sources of human error that stand in the way of knowledge into four groups, which he called "ghosts" ("idols", Latin idola). These are "ghosts of the clan", "ghosts of the cave", "ghosts of the square" and "ghosts of the theater".

"Ghosts of the genus" stem from human nature itself, they do not depend on culture or on the individuality of a person. "The human mind is likened to an uneven mirror, which, mixing its nature with the nature of things, reflects things in a distorted and disfigured form."

"Ghosts of the Cave" are individual errors of perception, both inborn and acquired. "After all, in addition to the errors inherent in the human race, everyone has their own special cave, which weakens and distorts the light of nature."

"Ghosts of the square" - a consequence of the social nature of man - communication and use of language in communication. “People are united by speech. The words are established according to the understanding of the crowd. Therefore, the bad and absurd establishment of words is amazingly besieging the mind. "

“Ghosts of the theater” are false ideas about the structure of reality, assimilated by a person from other people. "At the same time, we mean here not only general philosophical doctrines, but also numerous principles and axioms of sciences, which received strength as a result of tradition, faith and carelessness."

Followers

The most significant followers of the empirical line in modern philosophy: Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, George Berkeley, David Hume - in England; Etienne Condillac, Claude Helvetius, Paul Holbach, Denis Diderot - in France.

Biography

Bacon Francis, an English materialist philosopher, was born on January 22, 1561 in London in the family of an advisor to Queen Elizabeth I. His grandfather served as manager of a sheep-breeding estate for a large landowner, and his father became the Lord Keeper of the Royal Seal, had the title of Viscount, sat in the House of Lords , and was considered one of the prominent lawyers of his time. Francis graduated from the University of Cambridge, then carried out diplomatic assignments in Paris, served as a lawyer in London, was elected a member of the House of Commons, where he was the leader of the opposition. After the death of his elder brother, he received the position of Lord Chancellor under King James I and the title of Baron Verulam and Viscount of Saint Alban.

Being busy with state affairs did not prevent Bacon from writing the New Organon in 1620 - the main part of the philosophical treatise The Great Restoration of Sciences. The main idea of the treatise is the unstoppability and infinity of human progress, the praise of man as the main force of this process. Bacon referred history to the sphere of memory, poetry to the sphere of imagination, and philosophy to the sphere of reason. Diderot's Encyclopedia is based on these postulates.

In the field of artistic creation, Bacon considered Michel Montaigne to be his teacher. From 1597 to 1625 published his collection "Experiments, or Moral and Political Instructions", which contains Bacon's thoughts and aphorisms: "On Truth", "On Death", "On Wealth", "On Happiness", "On Beauty", "Studies in Science" , "About Husband", "About Superstition", etc.

He left a collection of essays "On the wisdom of the ancients" and an unfinished utopian novel "New Atlantis" (1623-1624), where he predicted the appearance of submarines and airplanes, the transmission of sound and light over a distance, targeted climate change, penetration into the secrets of longevity. He died on April 9, 1626 in London.

Biography

Bacon Francis (1561-1626)

English philosopher, statesman. Lord, Baron of Verulam, Viscount of St Albans. Francis Bacon was born on January 22, 1561 in London. At the age of 12 he entered the University of Cambridge, and at the age of 23 he was already a member of the House of Commons of the English Parliament, where he opposed Queen Elizabeth I on a number of issues. In 1584 Francis Bacon was elected to parliament. The political rise began in 1603, when King James I came to the throne. In 1612, Bacon became attorney general, in 1617 - Lord Keeper of the Seal, and in 1618 (until 1621) - Lord Chancellor under King James I. In 1621 year Francis Bacon was brought to trial on charges of bribery, removed from all posts and by decree of James I was imprisoned for two days. He was pardoned by the king, but did not return to public service.

“The years of Bacon's Lord Chancellorship were marked by executions, the distribution of pernicious monopolies, illegal arrests, and the imposition of biased sentences. Bacon returned from prison to his estate as a frail old man. As soon as he arrived home, he completely immersed himself in the study of natural sciences. His studies, usually devoted to subjects of vital use, took him again and again out of his office and into the fields, gardens, and stables of the estate. For hours he would talk with the gardener about how to improve the fruit trees, or give instructions to the maids how to measure the milk yield of each cow. At the end of 1625, my lord fell ill and lay dying. He had been sick all autumn, and in winter, not yet fully recovered, he rode in an open sleigh a few miles to the neighboring estate. When they were returning back, at the turn at the entrance to the estate, they crushed a chicken, apparently running out of the chicken coop. Having got out from under his blankets and furs, my lord got out of the sleigh and, in spite of what the coachman was telling him about the cold, went to where the chicken lay. She was dead. The old man told the stable boy to lift the hen and gut it. The boy did as he was ordered, and the old man, apparently forgetting both his illness and the cold, bent down and, groaning, gathered a handful of snow. Carefully he began to fill the carcass of a bird with snow. "In this way, it should remain fresh for many weeks," said the old man with enthusiasm. "Take her to the cellar and place her on the cold floor." He walked a short distance to the door, on foot, already a little tired and leaning heavily on the boy, who was carrying a chicken stuffed with snow under his arm. As soon as he entered the house, he was seized by a chill. The next day he took to his bed and tossed about in the intense heat. " (Bertolt Brecht, "Experience") Francis Bacon died on April 9, 1626 in the town of Highgate.

Francis Bacon is considered the founder of English materialism, the empirical movement. I saw the most important task of science in the conquest of nature and the expedient transformation of culture on the basis of knowledge of nature. Among the works of Francis Bacon - "Experiments, or instructions, moral and political" (1597; essays on various topics from moral and domestic to political), "The spread of education" ("On the dignity and augmentation of sciences"; De dignitate et augmentis scientiarum; 1605; a treatise calling to put experiments and observation as the basis for education), "New organon" (Novum organum scientiarum; 1620; part of the unfinished work "The Great Restoration of Sciences"), "New Atlantis" (Nova Atlatis; utopian story; work unfinished; project presented state organization of science).

Biography

BACON, Francis

Francis Bacon, an English philosopher and founder of English materialism, was born in London; was the youngest son of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal. For two years he studied at Trinity College, Cambridge University, then spent three years in France in the retinue of the British ambassador. After the death of his father in 1579, he entered the Graze Inn School of Lawyers to study law. In 1582 he became a barrister, in 1584 he was elected to parliament and until 1614 played a prominent role in debates at sessions of the House of Commons. In 1607 he was appointed general solicitor, in 1613 - general attorney; from 1617 the Lord Keeper of the Seal, from 1618 - the Lord Chancellor. Raised to the dignity of knighthood in 1603; Baron of Verulam (1618) and Viscount of St Albans (1621). In 1621, Mr .. was brought to trial on charges of bribery, removed from all posts and sentenced to a fine of 40 thousand pounds sterling and imprisonment in the Tower (as long as the king pleases). Pardoned by the king (he was released from the Tower on the second day, and the fine was forgiven him; in 1624 the sentence was completely canceled), Bacon did not return to public service and devoted the last years of his life to scientific and literary work.

Bacon's philosophy developed in an atmosphere of general scientific and cultural upsurge in European countries, which had embarked on the path of capitalist development, the liberation of science from the scholastic fetters of church dogma. All his life Bacon worked on grandiose plan"The great restoration of the sciences." A general outline of this plan was made by Bacon in 1620 in the preface to The New Organon, or True Instructions for the Interpretation of Nature (Novum Organum). The New Organon included six parts: a general overview of the current state of science, a description of a new method of obtaining true knowledge, a set of empirical data, a discussion of issues for further research, preliminary solutions and, finally, philosophy itself. Bacon only managed to sketch out the first two parts.

Science, according to Bacon, should give man power over nature, increase his power and improve his life. From this point of view, he criticized scholasticism and its syllogistic deductive method, to which he opposed the appeal to experience and the processing of it by induction, emphasizing the importance of experiment. Developing the rules for the application of the inductive method proposed by him, Bacon compiled tables of the presence, absence and degrees of various properties in individual objects of a particular class. The mass of facts collected at the same time should have made up the third part of his work - "Natural and Experimental History".

Emphasizing the importance of the method allowed Bacon to put forward a principle important for pedagogy, according to which the goal of education is not accumulation is possible. larger amount knowledge, and the ability to use methods of their acquisition. All existing and possible sciences Bacon divided according to the three abilities of the human mind: memory corresponds to history, imagination - poetry, reason - philosophy, which includes the doctrine of God, nature and man.

The reason for the delusion of reason Bacon considered false ideas - "ghosts" or "idols", of four types: "ghosts of the genus" (idola tribus), rooted in the very nature of the human race and associated with the desire of man to consider nature by analogy with himself; "Ghosts of the cave" (idola specus), arising from the individual characteristics of each person; “Ghosts of the market” (idola fori), generated by an uncritical attitude to popular opinions and misused words; "Ghosts of the theater" (idola theatri), a false perception of reality based on blind faith in authorities and traditional dogmatic systems, similar to the deceptive plausibility of theatrical performances. Bacon considered matter as an objective variety of sensory qualities perceived by a person; Bacon's understanding of matter has not yet become mechanistic, as in G. Galileo, R. Descartes and T. Hobbes.

Bacon's doctrine had a tremendous impact on the subsequent development of science and philosophy, contributed to the formation of the materialism of T. Hobbes, the sensationalism of J. Locke and his followers. Bacon's logical method became the starting point for the development of inductive logic, especially in J.S. Mill. Bacon's call for the experimental study of nature was a stimulus for natural science in the 17th century. and played an important role in the creation of scientific organizations (for example, the Royal Society of London). Bacon's classification of sciences was adopted by the French encyclopedic educators.

Sources:

1. Great Soviet Encyclopedia. In 30 volumes.

2. Encyclopedic Dictionary. Brockhaus F.A., Efron I.A. In 86 volumes.

ru.wikipedia.org

Biography

Bacon Francis (1561-1626), English philosopher, statesman, Lord, Baron of Verulam, Viscount of St. Albans.

Francis Bacon was born on January 22, 1561 in London. At the age of 12 he entered the University of Cambridge, and at the age of 23 he was already a member of the House of Commons of the English Parliament, where he opposed Queen Elizabeth I on a number of issues.

In 1584 Francis Bacon was elected to parliament. A serious political career began when King James I came to the throne. In 1612, Bacon became attorney general, in 1617 - Lord Keeper of the Seal, and in 1618 (until 1621) - Lord Chancellor under King James I.

In 1621, Francis Bacon was tried on bribery charges and imprisoned for two days. He was pardoned by the king, but did not return to public service.

An interesting description of the work in the last period of F. Bacon's life is given by Brecht in his work "Experience"

“As soon as he arrived home, he completely immersed himself in the study of natural sciences. His classes, usually devoted to subjects of vital importance, again and again took him out of his office to the fields, gardens and stables of the estate. or instructing the maids how to measure the milk yield of each cow.

At the end of 1625, my lord fell ill and lay dying. He had been sick all autumn, and in winter, not yet fully recovered, he rode in an open sleigh a few miles to the neighboring estate. When they were returning back, at the turn at the entrance to the estate, they crushed a chicken, apparently running out of the chicken coop.

Having got out from under his blankets and furs, my lord got out of the sleigh and, in spite of what the coachman was telling him about the cold, went to where the chicken lay. She was dead. The old man told the stable boy to lift the hen and gut it. The boy did as he was ordered, and the old man, apparently forgetting both his illness and the cold, bent down and, groaning, gathered a handful of snow. Carefully he began to stuff the carcass of a bird with snow.

"In this way, it should remain fresh for many weeks," said the old man with enthusiasm. "Take her to the cellar and place her on the cold floor." He walked a short distance to the door, on foot, already a little tired and leaning heavily on the boy, who was carrying a chicken stuffed with snow under his arm. As soon as he entered the house, he was seized by a chill. The next day he took to his bed and tossed about in the intense heat. "

Biography

Francis Bacon, son of Nicholas Bacon, one of the highest dignitaries at the court of Queen Elizabeth, was born on January 22, 1561 in London. In 1573 g.

He entered Trinity College, Cambridge University. Three years later, F. Bacon, as part of an English mission, went to Paris, from where in 1579, due to the death of his father, he was forced to return to England.

Bacon's first field of independent activity was jurisprudence. He even became the elder of a law corporation. The young lawyer, however, regarded his successes in the legal field as a springboard to a political career. In 1584

Bacon was first elected to the House of Commons. Beginning with biting opposition rallies, he went on to become a zealous supporter of the crown. The rise of Bacon as a court politician came after the death of Elizabeth, at the court of James I Stuart. The king showered Bacon with ranks, awards, and awards. Since 1606, Bacon has held a number of fairly high positions (full-time QC, highest royal legal adviser).

Years of troublesome court service, however, allowed Bacon, who had an early taste for philosophy, in particular the philosophy of science, morality, law, to write and publish works that later glorified him as an outstanding thinker, the founder of modern philosophy. Back in 1597, his first work, Experiments and Instructions, was published, containing sketches, which he would then revise and republish twice. The treatise "On the Significance and Success of Knowledge, Divine and Human" dates back to 1605.

Meanwhile, in England, the time is coming for the absolutist rule of James I: in 1614 he dissolved parliament and until 1621 ruled alone. Needing loyal advisers, the king especially brought Bacon, by that time a skilled courtier, closer to him.

In 1616 Bacon became a member of the Privy Council, in 1617 - Lord Keeper of the Great Seal. In 1618 Bacon was already Lord, Supreme Chancellor and Peer of England, Baron of Verulam, from 1621 - Viscount of St. Albanian. During the "non-parliamentary" rule in England, the king's favorite, Lord Buckingham, reigned sovereign, and Bacon could not, and perhaps did not want to resist his style of government (waste, bribery, political persecution).

When, in 1621, the king still had to convene parliament, the parliamentarians' resentment finally found expression. An investigation into the corruption of officials has begun. Bacon, on trial, pleaded guilty. The peers condemned Bacon very harshly - right up to imprisonment in the Tower - but the king overturned the court's decision. There would be no happiness, but misfortune helped.

Set aside from politics, Bacon gave himself up to that beloved business, in which everything was decided not by intrigue and avarice, but pure cognitive interest and a deep mind for scientific and philosophical research. 1620 is marked by the publication of the New Organon, conceived as the second part of the work The Great Restoration of Sciences.

In 1623, an extensive work "On the Dignity of the Augmentation of Sciences" was published - the first part of "The Great Restoration of Sciences". Bacon also tried the pen in the genre fashionable in the 17th century. philosophical utopia - he writes "New Atlantis". Among other works of the outstanding English thinker, one should also mention "Thoughts and Observations", "On the Wisdom of the Ancients", "On the Sky", "On the Causes and Beginnings", "History of the Winds", "The History of Life and Death", "The History of Henry VII" and etc.

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F. Bacon (1561 - 1626) is considered the ancestor of New European philosophy, since it was he who owns a new view of philosophy, which was later widely developed: "... the fruits brought ... and practical inventions are, as it were, guarantors and witnesses of the truth of philosophies." His dictum: "Knowledge is power" expresses the attitude towards science as the main means of solving human problems.

By origin, Bacon belonged to the circles of the court bureaucracy, received a university education. His most important works are The New Organon (1620) and On the Dignity and Growth of Science (1623). In them, the author proceeds from the objective needs of society and expresses the interests of the progressive forces of that time, focusing on empirical research, on the knowledge of nature. The main goal of cognition, as F. Bacon believed, is to strengthen the power of man over nature. For this it is necessary to abandon the scholastic speculative methods of cognition, to turn to nature itself and the knowledge of its laws. Therefore, the subject of it epistemology matter itself, its structure and transformations appeared.

For an objective study of nature, he turns to experience, for the best of all evidence is experience. Moreover, experience in Bacon's view is not an assimilation to the old empiricists who “... like an ant only collect and use what is collected”; experience must be combined with reason. This will help and avoid the limitations of rationalists, "... like a spider from themselves ..." create a fabric. His experience, according to his own observation, rather resembles the actions of a bee, which chooses middle way, "She extracts material from the flowers of the garden and field, but disposes and modifies it with her own skill." He divides the experiments into "luminiferous", which "... by themselves do not bring benefit, but contribute to the discovery of causes and axioms", and "fruitful", which directly benefit.

In his positions, F. Bacon entered the history of philosophy as a representative empiricism ... In his opinion, the conclusions of cognition - theories should be based on a new, inductive, method, i.e. movement from the particular to the general, from the experiment to the mental processing of the obtained material. Before Bacon, philosophers who wrote about induction paid attention mainly to those cases or facts that support provable or generalized positions. Bacon emphasized the importance of those cases that refute the generalization, contradict it. These are the so-called negative instances. Already one - the only such case is capable of completely or at least partially refuting a hasty generalization. According to Bacon, disregard for negative instances is main reason mistakes, superstitions and prejudices.

The new method, first of all, requires freeing the mind from preconceived ideas - ghosts, idols. He designated these idols as "family idols", "cave idols", "market idols", "theater idols". The first two are congenital, and the second are acquired in the course of individual human development.

"Idols of the genus" means that a person judges nature by analogy with himself, therefore, teleological errors of ideas about nature occur.

"Idols of the cave" arise as a result of subjective sympathies, antipathies to certain prevailing ideas.

"Idols of the market", or otherwise, "squares" arise as a result of communication between people through words that make it difficult to understand things, because their meaning was often established by chance, not on the basis of the essence of the subject.

The "idols of the theater" are generated by the uncritical assimilation of the opinions of authorities.

Bacon also creates one of the first classifications of sciences, based on the abilities of the human soul: history is built on the basis of memory, poetry is based on imagination, reason gives rise to philosophy, mathematics and natural science.

In his opinion, the immediate task of cognition is the study of the causes of objects. Causes can be either acting (what are usually called causes) or final causes, i.e. goals. The science of acting causes is physics; the science of goals or ultimate causes is metaphysics. The task of the science of nature is to investigate the acting causes. Therefore, Bacon saw the essence of natural science in physics. Knowledge about nature is used to improve practical life. Mechanics is concerned with the application of knowledge of acting causes. The application of the knowledge of the ultimate causes is in the hands of "natural magic." Mathematics, according to Bacon, has no purpose of its own and is only an auxiliary tool for natural science.

However, the views of Francis Bacon were of a dual nature: his ideas about the world could not yet be free from an appeal to God, he recognizes a double form of truth - scientific and the truth of "revelation."

Based on cognitive tasks, Bacon builds ontology ... In solving the problem of substance, he belonged to the materialists since believed that matter itself is the cause of all causes, not being itself caused by any cause. He uses the traditional concept of form to describe matter. But Aristotle's form is ideal, while Bacon understands form as the material essence of the properties of an object. According to him, form is a kind of movement of material particles that make up the body. The properties and qualities of an object are also material. Simple forms are carriers a certain number basic properties, to which all the variety of properties of things can be reduced. There are as many elementary properties of things in nature as simple forms... Bacon refers to such forms - properties as color, weight, movement, size, heat, etc. Just as from a small number of letters of the alphabet huge number words, so from combinations of simple forms an inexhaustible number of objects and natural phenomena are made up. Thus, Bacon considers every complex thing as a sum of simple compound forms, which means the principle of mechanism, i.e. reduction of the complex to the simple - to the primary elements. The quantitative side of things, he also refers to one of the forms, but believes that it is insufficient to define a thing.

Bacon's materialistic position in understanding nature also contained dialectical positions: movement, for example, was considered an inalienable intrinsic property of matter. He even singled out various forms of movement, although at that time it was customary to consider only one - mechanical, simple movement of bodies.

Francis Bacon's materialism was limited. His teaching presupposes an understanding of the world as material, but essentially consisting of a finite number of basic parts, limited quantitatively and qualitatively. This view was further developed in the metaphysical materialism of modern European philosophy.

The duality of Bacon's position manifested itself in the doctrine of man .

Man is dual. By its physicality, it belongs to nature and is studied by philosophy and science. But the human soul is a complex formation: it consists of a rational and sensual soul. The rational soul enters a person by "divine inspiration", therefore it is investigated by theology. The sensual soul has physical features and is the subject of philosophy.

Francis Bacon's contribution to science and philosophy was of great importance, since, in contrast to scholasticism, he puts forward a new methodology aimed at genuine knowledge of nature, its internal laws. In fact, his work opened a new historical form of philosophy - the new European one.

Francis Bacon (1561-1626) is considered the founder of the experimental science of modern times. He was the first philosopher to set himself the task of creating a scientific method. In his philosophy, for the first time, the main principles that characterize the philosophy of modern times were formulated.

Bacon came from a noble family and throughout his life was engaged in public and political activities: was a lawyer, member of the House of Commons, Lord Chancellor of England. Shortly before the end of his life, society condemned him, accusing him of bribery in the conduct of court cases. He was sentenced to a large fine (40,000 pounds sterling), deprived of parliamentary powers, dismissed from the court. He died in 1626, having caught a cold while stuffing a chicken with snow to prove that the cold keeps meat from spoiling, and thus to demonstrate the power of the experimental scientific method he was developing.

From the very beginning of his philosophical creative activity, Bacon opposed the dominant scholastic philosophy at that time and put forward the doctrine of "natural" philosophy based on experiential knowledge. Bacon's views were formed on the basis of the achievements of the natural philosophy of the Renaissance and included a naturalistic world outlook with the foundations of an analytical approach to the phenomena under study and empiricism. He proposed an extensive program for the restructuring of the intellectual world, sharply criticizing the scholastic concepts of previous and contemporary philosophy.

Bacon strove to bring the "boundaries of the mental world" in line with all those tremendous achievements that took place in contemporary Bacon society of the 15th-16th centuries, when the experimental sciences were most developed. Bacon expressed the solution to the problem in the form of an attempt at a "great restoration of the sciences", which he outlined in the treatises: "On the Dignity and Augmentation of the Sciences" (his greatest work), "New Organon" (his main work) and other works on "natural history" , individual phenomena and processes of nature. Bacon's understanding of science primarily included a new classification of sciences, based on such abilities of the human soul as memory, imagination (fantasy), and reason. Accordingly, the main sciences, according to Bacon, should be history, poetry, philosophy. The highest task of knowledge and all sciences, according to Bacon, is dominance over nature and the improvement of human life. According to the head of the "House of Solomon" (a kind of research center. Academy, the idea of which was put forward by Bacon in the utopian novel "New Atlantis"), "the goal of society is to understand the causes and hidden forces of all things, to expand the power of man over nature, until everything is will become possible for him "

The criterion for the success of the sciences is the practical results to which they lead. "The fruits and practical inventions are, as it were, the guarantors and witnesses of the truth of philosophy." Knowledge is power, but only that knowledge that is true. Therefore, Bacon makes a distinction between two types of experience: fruitful and luminous.

The first are such experiments that directly benefit man, the luminous ones are those whose purpose is to understand the deep connections of nature, the laws of phenomena, the properties of things. The second type of experiments Bacon considered more valuable, since without their results it is impossible to carry out fruitful experiments. The unreliability of the knowledge we receive is due, Bacon believes, to a dubious form of proof, which relies on a syllogistic form of substantiating ideas, consisting of judgments and concepts. However, the concepts, as a rule, are formed insufficiently substantiated. In his criticism of the theory of Aristotelian syllogism, Bacon proceeds from the premise that the general concepts used in deductive proof are the result of experimental knowledge made extremely hastily. For his part, recognizing the importance of general concepts that make up the foundation of knowledge, Bacon believed that the main thing is to form these concepts correctly, since if concepts are formed hastily, by accident, then there is no strength in what is built on them. The main step in the reform of science proposed by Bacon should be the improvement of the methods of generalization, the creation of a new concept of induction.

The experimental-inductive method of Bacon consisted in the gradual formation of new concepts by interpreting the facts and phenomena of nature. Only through such a method, according to Bacon, it is possible to discover new truths, and not to mark time. Without rejecting deduction, Bacon defined the difference and peculiarities of these two methods of cognition in the following way: “Two ways exist and can exist for the discovery of truth. discovers the middle axioms. This way is used now. The other way deduces the axioms from sensations and particulars, rising continuously and gradually, until finally comes to the most general axioms. This is the true way, but not tested. "

Although the problem of induction was posed earlier by previous philosophers, only in Bacon it acquires a dominant significance and acts as the primary means of cognizing nature. In contrast to induction by simple enumeration, which was widespread at the time, he brings to the fore what he says is true induction, which gives new conclusions based not so much on the observation of supporting facts, but as a result of the study of phenomena that contradict the position being proved. One single case is capable of refuting an ill-considered generalization. Disregard for the so-called negative instances, according to Bacon, is the main reason for mistakes, superstitions, and prejudices.

In the inductive method of Bacon, the necessary stages include the collection of facts, their systematization. Bacon put forward the idea of compiling three study tables - a table of presence, absence and intermediate stages. If, using Bacon's favorite example, someone wants to find a form of heat, then he collects various cases of heat in the first table, trying to weed out everything that has nothing in common, i.e. what is when warmth is present. In the second table, he brings together cases that are similar to those in the first, but which have no warmth. For example, the first table might list the rays of the sun that create heat, the second might include things like rays from the moon or stars that don't create heat. On this basis, it is possible to weed out all those things that are present when heat is present. Finally, the third table collects cases in which heat is present in varying degrees. By using these three tables together, we can, according to Bacon, figure out the reason that underlies heat, namely, according to Bacon, movement. This is the manifestation of the principle of studying the general properties of phenomena, their analysis. Bacon's inductive method also includes conducting an experiment.

To conduct an experiment, it is important to vary it, repeat it, move it from one area to another, reverse the circumstances, stop it, link it with others and study it in slightly changed circumstances. After that, you can proceed to the decisive experiment. Bacon put forward the empirical generalization of facts as the core of his method, but he was not a defender of a one-sided understanding of it. Bacon's empirical method is distinguished by the fact that he relied as much as possible on reason when analyzing facts. Bacon compared his method to the art of a bee, which, extracting nectar from flowers, processes it into honey with its own skill. He condemned the rude empiricists who, like an ant, collect everything that comes their way (meaning the alchemists), as well as those speculative dogmatists who, like a spider, weave a web of knowledge from themselves (meaning the scholastics). The prerequisite for the reform of science should be, according to Bacon's plan, the cleansing of the mind from delusions, of which there are four types. He calls these obstacles on the path of knowledge idols: idols of the clan, caves, squares, theaters. Idols of the genus are errors due to the hereditary nature of man. Human thinking has its drawbacks, since "it is likened to an uneven mirror, which, mixing its nature with the nature of things, reflects things in a distorted and disfigured form."

Man constantly interprets nature by analogy with man, which finds its expression in the teleological attribution of finite goals to nature that are not characteristic of it. This is the manifestation of the idol of the clan. The habit of waiting larger order in the phenomena of nature than in reality can be found in them - these are the idols of the genus. The idols of the Bacon clan also include the desire of the human mind for unreasonable generalizations. He pointed out that often the orbits of rotating planets are considered circular, which is unreasonable. Cave idols are mistakes that are characteristic of an individual or some groups of people due to subjective sympathies and preferences. For example, some researchers believe in the infallible authority of antiquity, while others tend to give preference to the new. "The human mind is not dry light, it is strengthened by will and passions, and this gives rise to what everyone desires in science. Man rather believes in the truth of what he prefers ... In an infinite number of ways, sometimes imperceptible, passions stain and spoil the mind."

The idols of the square are errors generated by verbal communication and the difficulty of avoiding the influence of words on the minds of people. These idols arise because words are only names, signs for communication with each other, they do not say anything about what things are. Therefore, countless arguments about words arise when people mistake words for things.

Idols of the theater are mistakes associated with blind faith in authorities, uncritical assimilation of false opinions and views. Here Bacon had in mind the Aristotle system and scholasticism, in which blind faith had a restraining effect on development. scientific knowledge... He called truth the daughter of time, not authority. Artificial philosophical constructions and systems that have a negative impact on the minds of people are a kind of "philosophical theater", in his opinion. The inductive method developed by Bacon, which is the basis of science, should, in his opinion, investigate the forms inherent in matter, which are the material essence of a property belonging to an object - a certain type of motion. To distinguish the form of a property, it is necessary to separate everything that is accidental from the object. This exclusion of the accident, of course, is a thought process, an abstraction. Baconian forms are the forms of "simple natures" or properties that physicists study. Simple natures are things like hot, humid, cold, heavy, etc. They are like the "alphabet of nature" from which many things can be composed. Bacon refers to forms as "laws." They are determinants and elements of the fundamental structures of the world. The combination of various simple shapes gives all the variety of real things. The understanding of form developed by Bacon was contrasted with the speculative interpretation of form by Plato and Aristotle, since for Bacon form is a kind of movement of the material particles that make up the body. In the theory of knowledge, for Bacon, the main thing is to investigate the causes of phenomena. The reasons can be different - or acting, which deals with physics, or final, which deals with metaphysics.