Francis Bacon wrote more than 30 works of philosophy and many other tracts on law and science. He is regarded by many as the father of British empiricism. In his Novum Organum (1620), he presents a "new method" for acquiring knowledge that abandons the traditional deference toward the received wisdoms of Aristotle and other classical sources and advocates inductive, theory-free observations by the senses. The main features of Baconian scientific inquiry (chastity, holiness and legality), Bacon's criteria for assessing the merit of philosophical ideas (usefulness and charitgy), the main themes of Bacon's Instauratio Magna; and his identification of obstacles to the acquisition of knowledge (anti-Aristotlean).

I. Francis Bacon sought to acquire useful knowledge. He took a distaste for Aristotle and Scholasticism while a student at Trinity College.

II. Bacon rebelled against the regnant Western philosophical tradition.

A. He attacked it for confusing religious and natural knowledge and for emphasing concern...