Francis Bacon and the Transformation of Early-Modern Philosophy
Author | : Stephen Gaukroger |
Publisher | : Cambridge University Press |
Total Pages | : 263 |
Release | : 2001-03-19 |
ISBN-10 | : 9781139428828 |
ISBN-13 | : 1139428829 |
Rating | : 4/5 (829 Downloads) |
Download or read book Francis Bacon and the Transformation of Early-Modern Philosophy written by Stephen Gaukroger and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2001-03-19 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This ambitious and important book, first published in 2001, provides a truly general account of Francis Bacon as a philosopher. It describes how Bacon transformed the values that had underpinned philosophical culture since antiquity by rejecting the traditional idea of a philosopher as someone engaged in contemplation of the cosmos. The book explores in detail how and why Bacon attempted to transform the largely esoteric discipline of natural philosophy into a public practice through a program in which practical science provided a model that inspired many from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries. Stephen Gaukroger shows that this reform of natural philosophy was dependent on the creation of a new philosophical persona: a natural philosopher shaped through submission to the dictates of Baconian method. This book will be recognized as a major contribution to Baconian scholarship, of special interest to historians of early-modern philosophy, science, and ideas.