Editing Francis Bacon (section)

===Science===
{{see also|Baconian method|Idola fori}}
[[File:Loc-bacon-highsmith cropped.jpg|thumb|Statue of Bacon in the [[Library of Congress]] in [[Washington, D.C.]]]]
[[File:Frontispiece to 'The History of the Royal-Society of London'.jpg|thumb|upright=1|[[National Portrait Gallery, London|National Portrait Gallery]] painting of the front cover of ''The History of Royal-Society of London'', picturing Bacon (right) among the founding influences of [[Royal Society]]]]
Bacon's seminal work the ''[[Novum Organum]]'' was highly influential in the 17th century among scholars, in particular Sir [[Thomas Browne]], who in his encyclopedia ''[[Pseudodoxia Epidemica]]'' (1646–72) frequently adheres to a Baconian approach to his scientific enquiries. This book entails the basis of the scientific method as a means of observation and induction.  Also [[Robert Hooke]] was highly influenced by Bacon, using Baconian language and ideas in his book, "[[Micrographia]]."

According to Bacon, learning and knowledge all derive from inductive reasoning. Through his belief in experimentally-derived data, he theorised that all the knowledge that was necessary to fully understand a concept could be attained using induction.  "Induction" in this context can be thought of as "reasoning from evidence," as opposed to "deduction," or "top-down reasoning," which can be thought of as "reasoning from a pre-existing premise, or hypothesis." In order to get to the point of an inductive conclusion, one must consider the importance of observing the particulars (specific parts of nature). "Once these particulars have been gathered together, the interpretation of Nature proceeds by sorting them into a formal arrangement so that they may be presented to the understanding."<ref>{{cite journal|last=Turner|first=Henry S.|date=2013|title=Francis Bacon's Common Notion|journal=Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies|volume=13|issue=3|pages=7–32|doi=10.1353/jem.2013.0023|s2cid=153693271|issn=1553-3786}}</ref> Experimentation is essential to discovering the truths of Nature. When an experiment happens, the data is used to form a result and conclusion. Note that this process does not involve a pre-existing hypothesis. On the contrary, inductive reasoning starts with data, not a prior premise or hypothesis. Through this conclusion of particulars, an understanding of Nature can be formed. Now that an understanding of Nature has been arrived at, an inductive conclusion can be drawn. "There are and can be only two ways of searching into and discovering truth. The one flies from the senses and particulars to the most general axioms, and from these principles, the truth of which it takes for settled and immovable, proceeds to judgment and to the discovery of middle axioms. And this way is now in fashion. The other derives axioms from the senses and particulars, rising by a gradual and unbroken ascent, so that it arrives at the most general axioms last of all. This is the true way, but as yet untried." (Bacon's axiom XIX from the Novum Organum) <ref>{{Cite book|last=Bacon|first=Francis|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/bibliography/17510|title=Novum Organum|editor-last=Devey|editor-first=Joseph|date=1902|publisher=Collier|location=New York|doi=10.5962/bhl.title.17510}}</ref>

Bacon explains how we come to this understanding and knowledge because of this process in comprehending the complexities of nature. "Bacon sees nature as an extremely subtle complexity, which affords all the energy of the natural philosopher to disclose her secrets."<ref>{{cite journal|last=Brooks|first=Christopher|date=1993|title=Daniel R. Coquillette. Francis Bacon. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press. 1992. pp. x, 358.|journal=Albion|volume=25|issue=3|pages=484–485|doi=10.2307/4050890|issn=0095-1390|jstor=4050890}}</ref> Bacon described the evidence and proof revealed through taking a specific example from nature and expanding that example into a general, substantial claim of nature. Once we understand the particulars in nature, we can learn more about it and become surer of things occurring in nature, gaining knowledge and obtaining new information all the while. "It is nothing less than a revival of Bacon's supremely confident belief that inductive methods can provide us with ultimate and infallible answers concerning the laws and nature of the universe."<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Nisbet|first=H. B.|date=1967|title=Herder and Francis Bacon|journal=The Modern Language Review|volume=62|issue=2|pages=267–283|doi=10.2307/3723840|issn=0026-7937|jstor=3723840}}</ref> Bacon states that when we come to understand parts of nature, we can eventually understand nature better as a whole because of induction. Because of this, Bacon concludes that all learning and knowledge must be drawn from inductive reasoning.

During the [[English Restoration|Restoration]], Bacon was commonly invoked as a guiding spirit of the [[Royal Society]] founded under Charles II in 1660.<ref>{{cite book |first=Julian |last=Martin |title=Francis Bacon: The State and the Reform of Natural Philosophy |year=1992 |place=Cambridge|publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-38249-6 }}{{Page needed|date=January 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |first=Byron |last=Steel |title=Sir Francis Bacon: The First Modern Mind |place=Garden City, NY |publisher=Doubleday, Doran & Co |year=1930 }}</ref> During the 18th-century [[French Enlightenment]], Bacon's non-metaphysical approach to science became more influential than the dualism of his French contemporary [[René Descartes|Descartes]], and was associated with criticism of the ''[[Ancien Régime]]''. In 1733 [[Voltaire]] introduced him to a French audience as the "father" of the [[scientific method]], an understanding which had become widespread by the 1750s.<ref>Hundert, EJ. (1987), "Enlightenment and the decay of common sense." In: Frits van Holthoon & David R. Olson (Eds.), ''Common Sense: The Foundations for Social Science'' (pp. 133–154 [136]). Lanham, MD: University Press of America. </ref> In the 19th century his emphasis on [[Induction (philosophy)|induction]] was revived and developed by [[William Whewell]], among others. He has been reputed as the "Father of Experimental Philosophy".<ref>{{cite book |first=Peter |last=Urbach |title=Francis Bacon's Philosophy of Science: An Account and a Reappraisal |publisher=Open Court Publishing Co |place=La Salle, Ill. |year=1987 |isbn=978-0-912050-44-7 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/francisbaconsphi0000urba }} p. 192. "Bacon's celebrity as a philosopher of science has sunk since the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, when he earned the title of 'Father of Experimental Philosophy{{' "}}.</ref>

He also wrote a long treatise on Medicine, ''History of Life and Death'',<ref>{{cite book |last=Bacon |first=Francis |title=History of Life and Death |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dW5lJ9-LeBAC |isbn=978-0-7661-6272-3 |year=2003 |publisher=Kessinger }}{{Dead link|date=October 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> with natural and experimental observations for the prolongation of life.

One of his biographers, the historian [[William Hepworth Dixon]], states: "Bacon's influence in the modern world is so great that every man who rides in a train, sends a telegram, follows a [[steam plough]], sits in an easy chair, crosses the channel or the Atlantic, eats a good dinner, enjoys a beautiful garden, or undergoes a painless surgical operation, owes him something."<ref>{{cite book |last=Hepworth Dixon |first=William |title=The story of Lord Bacon's Life |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zd05AAAAcAAJ&pg=PP1|year=1862}}</ref>

In 1902 [[Hugo von Hofmannsthal]] published a fictional letter, known as ''[[The Lord Chandos Letter]]'', addressed to Bacon and dated 1603, about a writer who is experiencing a crisis of language.