Abstract

This paper claims that one way to bridge the gap between Francis Bacon’s speculative philosophy and his natural historical and experimental investigations is by looking at his peculiar top-down strategy of measuring Nature. Key to this strategy is the construction of perceptive instruments, i.e., devices “subtle enough” to detect and map natural limits, powers and virtues. In this paper, I discuss some of Bacon’s ideas for the development of perceptive instruments, and I show how his particular investigative strategy leads to the construction of an interesting and insufficiently investigated operational vocabulary. I focus on two particular terms of this vocabulary, “orbs of virtue” and “perception.” I show that, although originating in a natural-philosophical context, both terms acquire new, operational meanings in Bacon’s late natural histories. They vindicate the use of instruments and provide the necessary tools for a complex and interesting top-down approach to measuring Nature.

中文翻译：

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弗朗西斯·培根（Francis Bacon）的“感知”乐器

摘要

本文认为，弥合弗朗西斯·培根的投机哲学与他的自然历史和实验研究之间的鸿沟的一种方法是看他独特的自上而下的测量自然的策略。该策略的关键是构建感知工具，即“足够微妙”的设备来检测和绘制自然界限，能力和美德。在本文中，我讨论了培根开发感知工具的一些想法，并展示了他的特殊调查策略如何导致构建有趣且研究不足的操作词汇。我专注于该词汇表中的两个特定术语，即“美德宝珠”和“知觉”。我证明，尽管这两个术语起源于自然哲学背景，但它们在培根的晚期自然历史中都获得了新的，可操作的含义。