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British Empiricism
Macro Writing Assignment 1:
Exam

Professor Gayle Ormiston

Francis Bacon, The New Organon

A. Short Answer. Answer each of the following questions in complete sentences. Your answer should be as concise as possible but not at the expense of substance.

  1. What is the subtitle to Bacon's New Organon?
  2. What is the aim of knowledge, according to Bacon?
3. What is Bacon's criticism of the method of demonstration used in Aristotle's Organon? In place of demonstration, what does Bacon offer? (you need to mention Bacon's exact phrase here.)

 

 

4. What is Bacon's "great instauration"? What is the aim of this "great instauration."

 

 

5. According to Bacon, what is the difference between acatalepsia and eucatalepsia?

 

 

B. Matching. Match the items listed under column I with the items listed under column II. Beware! This is not for the faint of heart!

I. II.
1. innate a. Idols of the Theatre
2. adventitiousb. Idols of the Cave
3. obsession with a favorite subject c. Idols of the Market Place
4. the Empirical schoold. Idols of the Tribe
5. arises from human nature
6. philosophic systems
7. the alliance of words and understanding
8. arises from an excessive tendency to compare
9. the Superstitious
10. describes the tendencies of human understanding

C. Matching too, and more! Match the items listed under column I with the items listed under column II. Then, answer the subsequent question.

I. II.
1. the anta. the speculation of rationalism
2. the spiderb. the collection/accumulation of the merely empirical
3. the beec. active experimentation (the true business of philosophy)
d. none of the above

NOW: Explain how Bacon's analogy regarding the activities of the ant, the spider, and the bee helps one to understand that real aim of his new logic is to protect the mind against itself, that is as John Dewey says, "to teach it to undergo a patient and prolonged apprenticeship to fact in its infinite variety and particularity: to obey nature intellectually in order to command it practically."

D. Essay. Answer each of the following questions. Your answers should be written in complete sentences, detailed, and to the point.

  1. What is the "new organon" Bacon proposes in his text?
  2. What role does this organon play in the "great instauration"?
  3. How is the "art of interpreting nature" related to the new organon?
D. Essay Continued 2. In Book II of The New Organon Bacon says "Men's labor therefore should be turned to the investigations and observations of the resemblances and analogies of things, as well in whole as in parts. For these it is that detect the unity of nature, and lay a foundation for the constitution of sciences." Explain how the "Presentation of Instances to the Understanding" supports Bacon's assertion.

This page is part of the OhioLINK History of Philosophy Instructional Website designed and developed by the Department of Philosophy at Kent State University. We are interested in any comments you may have concerning this Macro Writing Exercise. Send e-mail to the KSU Department of Philosophy Instructional Website Development Team or directly to Professor Gayle Ormiston, who designed this exercise.

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