Roger Bacon - Changing Interpretations of Bacon

Changing Interpretations of Bacon

In the 19th century it was a widely held interpretation that Bacon was a modern experimental scientist who emerged before his time. This reflected two prevalent views of the period: an emphasis upon experiment as the principal form of scientific activity and a general acceptance of the characterization of the Middle Ages as the "Dark Ages". Some writers of the period carried this account further. For instance, according to Andrew Dickson White, Bacon was repeatedly persecuted and imprisoned because of the opposition of the medieval Church. In this view, which is still reflected in some 21st-century popular science books, Bacon would be an advocate of modern experimental science who somehow emerged as an isolated figure in an age supposed to be hostile toward scientific ideas. He was also presented as a visionary; for instance Frederick Mayer wrote that Bacon predicted the invention of the submarine, automobile, and airplane.

However, in the course of the 20th century, the philosophical understanding of the role of experiment in the sciences was substantially modified. Starting with works of Pierre Duhem, Raoul Carton, and Lynn Thorndike, Bacon's advocacy of scientia experimentalis has been argued to differ from modern experimental science. New historical research has also shown that medieval Christians were not generally opposed to scientific investigation and revealed the extent and variety of medieval science. In fact, many medieval sources of and influences on Bacon's scientific activity have been identified. For instance, Bacon's idea that inductively derived conclusions should be submitted for further experimental testing is very much like Robert Grosseteste's 'Method of Verification', and Bacon's work on optics and the calendar also followed the lines of inquiry of Grosseteste.

As a result, the picture of Bacon has changed. One recent study summarized that: "Bacon was not a modern, out of step with his age, or a harbinger of things to come, but a brilliant, combative, and somewhat eccentric schoolman of the thirteenth century, endeavoring to take advantage of the new learning just becoming available while remaining true to traditional notions... of the importance to be attached to philosophical knowledge". Bacon is thus seen as a leading, but not isolated, figure in the beginnings of medieval universities at Paris and Oxford, among other contemporary exponents of this shift in the philosophy of science (as we call it today), including Grosseteste (who preceded Bacon), William of Auvergne, Henry of Ghent, Albert Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, John Duns Scotus, and William of Ockham.

As to the alleged persecution, the first known reference to an imprisonment originates around 80 years after Bacon's death. It says the order was given by the head of the Franciscans because of unspecified "suspected novelties". However, the fact that no earlier report has been found drives skepticism over the assertion. Moreover, current historians of science who see an incarceration as plausible typically do not connect it with Bacon's scientific writings. Instead, if it happened, scholars speculate that his troubles resulted from such things as his sympathies for radical Franciscans, attraction to contemporary prophecies, or interest in certain astrological doctrines. Bacon's personality has also been mentioned as a factor.

A recent review of the many visions that each age has held about Roger Bacon says contemporary scholarship still neglects one of the most important aspects of his life and thought: the commitment to the Franciscan order. "His Opus maius was a plea for reform addressed to the supreme spiritual head of the Christian faith, written against a background of apocalyptic expectation and informed by the driving concerns of the friars. It was designed to improve training for missionaries and to provide new skills to be employed in the defence of the Christian world against the enmity of non-Christians and of the Antichrist. It cannot usefully be read solely in the context of the history of science and philosophy."