How Bacon Became Baconian

Giglioni, Guido

doi:10.1007/978-94-007-4345-8_2

Guido Giglioni³

Part of the book series: Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science ((BSPS,volume 282))

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Abstract

Francis Bacon’s metaphysics of material desires represents a major contribution to early-modern natural philosophy and theories of matter. By material desires, Bacon meant a limited set of primordial appetites deemed to govern all natural phenomena. He was convinced that through experimental trials natural philosophers could identify such basic appetites, classify them by means of increasingly comprehensive interpretative frameworks (inductions) and control them through direct manipulations (superinductions). Because of its focus on appetites—appetites within matter, but also appetites in men—Bacon’s program of inventio, inductio and superinductio of material desires can be described as an original model of natural-political inquiry.

I would like to thank Sophie Roux, Daniel Garber, Michael Hunter, and one anonymous reviewer for their suggestions and comments.

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Notes

1.
On Bacon’s metaphysics of material desires, see Giglioni, Francesco Bacone, 59–95; “Mastering the Appetites of Matter: Francis Bacon’s Sylva Sylvarum.”
2.
Cudworth, The True Intellectual System of the Universe, II, p. 606.
3.
Clagett, Giovanni Marliani and Late Medieval Physics, p. 79: “Antiperistasis is defined as the supposed sudden increase of the intensity of a quality as a result of being surrounded by its contrary quality, for instance, the sudden heating of a warm body when surrounded by a cold.”
4.
See Giglioni, “Fantasy Islands: Utopia, The Tempest, and New Atlantis as Places of Controlled Credulousness”; “The Material Foundations of Francis Bacon’s Utopia.”
5.
Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, pp. 118, 134. In De augmentis scientiarum, Bacon calls this mechanica “operaria” (Works, vol. I, p. 572). See Weeks, “The Role of Mechanics in Francis Bacon’s Great Instauration.”
6.
Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, p. 156.
7.
Ibid., p. 13. See ibid, p. 118.
8.
Ibid., p. 195.
9.
Bacon, Comentarius solutus sive pandecta, sive ancilla memoriae, in Works, vol. XI, pp. 65f.
10.
Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, p. 102: “Inficitur autem intellectus humanus ex intuitu eorum, quae in artibus mechanicis fiunt, in quibus corpora per compositiones aut separationes ut plurimum alterantur, ut cogitet simile quiddam etiam in natura rerum universali fieri. Unde fluxit commentum illud elementorum, atque illorum concursus, ad constituenda corpora naturalia.”
11.
Ibid., p. 116.
12.
Ibid., pp. 156–158.
13.
Ibid., p. 214; Sylva Sylvarum, in Works, vol. II, p. 378. See De augmentis scientiarum, in Works vol. I, p. 571: “Physica siquidem et inquisitio Causarum Efficientium et Materialium producit Mechanicam; at Metaphysica et Inquisitio Formarum producit Magiam.”
14.
Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, p. 274 (I, aph. 23).
15.
See also Bacon, Historia vitae et mortis, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XII, pp. 314–316.
16.
Bacon, Abecedarium novum naturae, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XIII, p. 186: “qualia sunt animata, et machinae, et organa mechanica, et huiusmodi.”
17.
Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, pp. 42 f. (In this passage machina should be translated as “device” rather than “machine”).
18.
Ibid., pp. 54f. See Stewart, “Res, veluti per Machinas, Conficiatur: Natural History and the ‘Mechanical’ Reform of Natural Philosophy”, Early Science and Medicine, 17 (2012), pp. 87–111.
19.
Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, pp. 134f.
20.
Bacon, Abecedarium novum naturae, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XIII, p. 172: “Pertinet autem Abecedarium ad Instaurationis partem quartam, quae est scala sive machina intellectus.” See Giglioni, “Reading Nature without Making a Book of It: Francis Bacon’s Novum Organum.”
21.
Bacon, Cogitationes de natura rerum, in Works, vol. III, p. 31.
22.
Ibid., pp. 29f.
23.
Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, pp. 386–387. See also De principiis atque originibus, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. VI, p. 264: “omnis ille motus mechanicus … nihil aliud est quam nixus partium corporis emissi ad se expediendum a compressione”; Sylva sylvarum, in Works, vol. II, p. 342 (the motion through which the smallest parts of a body respond to external pressures creating an “inward tumult” is “the chief root of all mechanical operations”), p. 382 (“the tumult in the parts of solid bodies when they are compressed, which is the cause of all flight of bodies through the air, and of other mechanical motions”).
24.
Glisson, De natura substantiae energetica, p. 340. See ibid., p. 375.
25.
Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, pp. 262–271. Robert Kargon is one of the very few who have acknowledged the non-mechanical nature of Bacon’s explanation of heat (Atomism in England, pp. 51f.). On Bacon’s discussion of the nature of heat, see Garber’s chapter (Chap. 1) in this volume.
26.
Bacon, New Atlantis, in The Major Works, pp. 484–486.
27.
Ibid., p. 480.
28.
Bacon, Sylva Sylvarum, in Works, vol. II, p. 602.
29.
Bacon, Historia vitae et mortis, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XII, pp. 314–316. See also Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, p. 290 (II, aph. 27): on account of the analogical instances (instantiae conformes), “organa sensuum et corpora quae pariunt reflexiones ad sensus, esse similis naturae. Rursus ex hoc ipso admonitus intellectus, non aegre insurgit ad axioma quoddam altius et nobilius. Hoc nimirum: Nihil interesse inter consensus, sive sympathias corporum sensu praeditorum, et inanimatorum sine sensu, nisi quod in illis accedat spiritus animalis ad corpus ita dispositum, in his autem absit. Adeo ut quot sint consensus in corporibus animatis, tot possint esse sensus in animalibus, si essent perforationes in corpore animato, ad discursum spiritus animalis in membrum rite dispositum, tanquam in organum idoneum. Et rursus, quot sint sensus in animalibus, tot sint proculdubio motus in corpore inanimato, ubi spiritus animalis abfuerit; licet necesse sit multo plures esse motus in corporibus inanimatis, quam sensus in animatis, propter paucitatem organorum sensus. Atque huius rei ostendit se exemplum valde manifestum in doloribus. Etenim quum sint plura genera doloris in animalibus, et tanquam varii illius characteres (veluti alius est dolor ustionis, alius frigoris intensi, alius puncturae, alius compressionis, alius extensionis, et similium) certissimum est omnia illa, quoad motum, inesse corporibus inanimatis; veluti ligno, aut lapidi, cum uritur, aut per gelu constringitur, aut pungitur, aut scinditur, aut flectitur, aut tunditur, et sic de aliis; licet non subintrent sensus, propter absentiam spiritus animalis.”
30.
Bacon, Historia vitae et mortis, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XII, p. 346 “Inest Omni Tangibili Spiritus, Corpore crassiore obtectus, et obsessus.”
31.
Ibid., pp. 348–354.
32.
Bacon, De augmentis scientiarum, in Works, vol. I, p. 566.
33.
Bacon, Sylva Sylvarum, in Works, vol. II, p. 602; Historia vitae et mortis, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XII, pp. 314–316.
34.
On this point, see Giglioni, “Historia and Materia: The Philosophical Implications of Francis Bacon’s Natural History.”
35.
Stewart, Dissertation First Exhibiting the Progress of Metaphysical, Ethical and Political Philosophy since the Revival of Letters (1817 and 1822), cited by Penrose, The Reputation and Influence of Francis Bacon in the Seventeenth Century, p. 14. On the cultural meanings associated with “Baconianism” since the seventeenth century, see Rossi, “Formiche, ragni, epistemologia”; Pérez-Ramos, Francis Bacon’s Idea of Science, pp. 7–31.
36.
Malherbe, “L’induction baconienne,” p. 194: “Le baconisme des expérimentalistes est probablement, en partie, une arme dirigée contre le concept hobbien de la science.” On the use of experimental philosophy in an anti-Hobbesian fashion, see the classic study by Shapin and Shaffer, Leviathan and the Air-Pump.
37.
Rees, “Introduction” to Bacon, The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. VI, pp. lxx–lxxxv.
38.
Kargon, Atomism in England, p. 53.
39.
Ross, Arcana Microcosmi, p. 263.
40.
Sprat, History of the Royal Society, p. 36.
41.
[Ward and Wilkins], Vindiciae academiarum, p. 25.
42.
Ibid., p. 36.
43.
Webster, Samuel Hartlib and the Advancement of Learning, p. 6.
44.
Hartlib, Considerations Tending to the Happy Accomplishment of Englands Reformation, p. 132.
45.
Webster, Academiarum examen, pp. 19f., pp. 66–69.
46.
Ibid., p. 69.
47.
Ibid., p. 74.
48.
[Ward and Wilkins], Vindiciae academiarum, p. 46.
49.
Glisson, Anatomia hepatis, pp. 375–379. On Glisson’s anatomical use of Bacon’s theory of vital spirits, see Giglioni, The Genesis of Francis Glisson’s Philosophy of Life, pp. 86–88.
50.
Glisson, De natura substantiae energetica, pp. 86, 246, 340, 353, 354–357, 375f., 408f., 418f., 425.
51.
On Glisson’s sfortuna, see Giglioni, “What Ever Happened to Francis Glisson? Albrecht Haller and the Fate of Eighteenth-Century Irritability.”
52.
Ibid., pp. 359–363.
53.
Bacon, Abecedarium novum naturae, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XIII, pp. 172–224.
54.
The Novum Organum Epitomiz’d, p. 32. On the importance of aphorism 48, see Rees, “Introduction” to Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, pp. lxxxvii–lxxxviii.
55.
Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, p. 383.
56.
Glisson, Tractatus de ventriculo, pp. 366f.
57.
Tenison, in Baconiana, pp. 5–6. The passage is a clear echo of the beginning of Bacon’s Historia naturalis et experimentalis ad condendam philosophiam, published in 1622, in Works, vol. II, p. 13.
58.
Cudworth, The True Intellectual System of the Universe, II, p. 608. See also ibid., III, pp. 101f.
59.
Cudworth to Boyle, 16 October 1684, in Boyle, Correspondence, vol. VI, p. 48.
60.
Boyle, New Experiments Physico-Mechanical touching the Spring of Air, in Works, vol. I, p. 261.
61.
Boyle, Certain Physiological Essays, in Works, vol. II, p. 14.
62.
Boyle, A Defence of the Doctrine touching the Spring and Weight of the Air, in Works, vol. III, pp. 13, 50. On Boyle’s Baconianism, see Hunter, “Robert Boyle and the Early Royal Society”; Knight and Hunter, “Robert Boyle’s Memoirs for the Natural History of Human Blood (1684)”; Anstey and Hunter, “Robert Boyle’s Designe about Natural History.”
63.
Boyle, Certain Physiological Essays, in Works, vol. II, pp. 13, 24f.
64.
Boyle, New Experiments and Observations touching Cold, in Works, vol. IV, p. 208.
65.
On this point, see Davis and Hunter, “Introduction” to Boyle, A Free Enquiry into the Vulgarly Received Notion of Nature, in Works, vol. X, and Hunter and Davis, “The Making of Robert Boyle’s Free Enquiry.”
66.
Comenius, Disquisitiones de caloris et frigoris natura, in Opera omnia, vol. XII, p. 278.
67.
Ibid., p. 272.
68.
Ibid., p. 273.
69.
Ibid., p. 282. For a comparative analysis of Bacon’s and Comenius’ theories of matter, see Giglioni, “The Darkness of Matter and the Light of Nature.”
70.
On this point, see Giglioni, “The Hidden Life of Matter.”
71.
Webster, “The College of Physicians,” p. 410; Webster, The Great Instauration, pp. 96, 315; Hunter, Science and Society in Restoration England, p. 29.
72.
Cowley, “To the Royal Society,” in Sprat, The History of the Royal Society, sig. B^v.
73.
Sprat, History of the Royal Society, pp. 35f.
74.
Ibid., pp. 26, 30f., 40.
75.
Trevor-Roper, “Introduction” to Purver, The Royal Society, p. xv.
76.
Hunter, Science and Society in Restoration England, p. 33.
77.
[Ward and Wilkins], Vindiciae academiarum, pp. 49f.
78.
Penrose, The Reputation and Influence of Francis Bacon in the Seventeenth Century, pp. 21f.
79.
Novum organum Epitomiz’d, sig. A2.
80.
Rees, “Introduction” to Bacon, Novum organum, in The Oxford Francis Bacon, vol. XI, p. lxvii. Recent studies have emphasized the need to re-examine the reception of Bacon’s natural philosophy during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Here I am referring the reader to some of these studies: C. Pastorino, “Francis Bacon”; Anstey, “Locke, Bacon and Natural History”; Jalobeanu, “Bacon’s Brotherhood and its Classical Sources”; Jalobeanu, “The Fascination of Solomon’s House in Seventeenth Century England”; Hoquet, Buffon: Histoire naturelle et philosophie; Peterschmitt, “Bacon et la chimie”; Yeo, “Between Memory and Paperbooks.”
81.
Giglioni, “Reading Nature without Making a Book of It: Francis Bacon’s Novum Organum.”

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Giglioni, G. (2013). How Bacon Became Baconian. In: GARBER, D. (eds) The Mechanization of Natural Philosophy. Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science, vol 282. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4345-8_2

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4345-8_2
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