Case Study of a Philosophical Argument of Francis Bacon Assignment

Case Study of a Philosophical Argument of Francis Bacon - Assignment Example The essential framework of Bacon's theory can be summed up by saying that he insisted that a good scientist should not be an ant and mindlessly gather data but nor should he be a spider and spin empty theories. Any good scientist will lie somewhere between the two, and gather data and formulate theories and scientific truths from these observations of nature. This thought of Bacon's has been credited with perhaps setting the ball rolling on the huge amount of scientific advances made in the 17th century, simply because the old methods did not rely on observation and thought. Bacon believed, as scientists do today, that science is something that should follow certain outlines and procedures. Experimentation is key because it leads people to the truth, rather than something that simply propels their own personal ideas and desires. Truth is ultimately what we aim for in science today, and it seems odd that this would be a novel idea in the 17th century, but Bacon's philosophy was one of the first to suggest objective empiricism as a method in science However, although this might sound obvious to the modern reader, there are some philosophical arguments that have been used for and against the ideas of Bacon. For example, the scientific method relies on observations, but there is also the point that the senses themselves are unreliable and can lead to bias, whether we free our minds from idols or not. It is difficult to know whether our observations on nature and science are true because of how they work.; optical illusions are a good example of an argument against scientific inquiry in this way. However, it has to be suggested that there are no other ways of observing any scientific inquiry apart from to use the senses, because they are all we have. All tests rely on measurements, images or results that have to be viewed to be noted down and to form theories from them. There is very little else a scientist can do when it