retain ·the evidence of· the senses subject to certain constraints
If you are led •by the evidence of your senses
What does Francis mean by “the evidence of senses” here?
The passage that says it’s madness to do intellectual work without tools, I am not sure if I understand what those tools are. I guess they are something like principles of empiricism and rationality. If Francis looked at the state of science in different time points between the time he wrote the book and now, would he say that scientists mostly used the tools? Because it seems science is in an ok shape now.
I think the book’s title “The new organon” is bailey, and the passage about not wanting rivalry with ancient philosophers is motte.
I think you’re interpreting him correctly. Senses means what it normally means, and he probably means something like you shouldn’t trust them naively, thinking things like “heat is light because fire is bright and the sun is bright”, instead you need a methodology (tool) to interpret your sense experience, aggregate your experiences, seek out one’s missing experiences. He might also mean literal tools too. He later describes how to make a primitive thermometer.
I think he would think the science between him and now was a lot better and people are doing the thing he wanted. (Many people a lot of the time though not all of the people all of the time.) He probably would have opinions about p-values and publication bias, etc., but he’d still think things overall have been much better in the last 400 years.
Yeah, definitely some kind of motte and bailey thing going on.
What does Francis mean by “the evidence of senses” here?
The passage that says it’s madness to do intellectual work without tools, I am not sure if I understand what those tools are. I guess they are something like principles of empiricism and rationality. If Francis looked at the state of science in different time points between the time he wrote the book and now, would he say that scientists mostly used the tools? Because it seems science is in an ok shape now.
I think the book’s title “The new organon” is bailey, and the passage about not wanting rivalry with ancient philosophers is motte.
I think you’re interpreting him correctly. Senses means what it normally means, and he probably means something like you shouldn’t trust them naively, thinking things like “heat is light because fire is bright and the sun is bright”, instead you need a methodology (tool) to interpret your sense experience, aggregate your experiences, seek out one’s missing experiences. He might also mean literal tools too. He later describes how to make a primitive thermometer.
I think he would think the science between him and now was a lot better and people are doing the thing he wanted. (Many people a lot of the time though not all of the people all of the time.) He probably would have opinions about p-values and publication bias, etc., but he’d still think things overall have been much better in the last 400 years.
Yeah, definitely some kind of motte and bailey thing going on.