Sir Francis Bacon: Greatest Contribution of the 17th Century
I am an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, orator, and author. With all of those professions how could one not possibly adore me? From little detail one could start picking up that I am multi-talented. Indeed I am a renaissance man for my contributions of my humanitarian views of life and my many talents depict me of a mastery of all things. I truly believe that I have brought forth the greatest intellectual contribution to European society and for many centuries to come. On January 22nd 1516 in London, England the greatest creation in history was established; Sir Francis Bacon was born. Even at birth I was exposed to greatness for my father Nicholas Bacon was a famous politician and Lord Keeper; basically an officer of the English Crown who was in charge of the Crown’s great seal.1 He was the Lord Keeper of the Crown’s great seal during the reign of Queen Elizabeth.2 I was homeschooled until I reached the age of 12 where I enrolled at Trinity College; a year afterwards I studied law at Honorable Society of Gray’s Inn.3 In 1588 I was employed as a member for Cornwall in the House of Commons with many years served in the parliament by 1617 I joined the family business of becoming a Lord Keeper of the great seal. At the age of 60 I dropped my political career in which I had time to focus on my other passion philosophy of science. My claim to fame is my contribution towards science and religion. Pre renaissance ideas and actions were judged upon what the church approves of; due to my humanist mind set this all changed. I formulated the idea of Empiricism; Empiricism is the theory of knowledge that one can only gain knowledge through their senses. This separated religion from science because religion holds the perspective that the Bible is God’s word thus having all the answers that one needs. Empiricism allows individuals to rely on oneself as opposed to listening to some may call biased...