The Function of the Doctrine of Prejudice
The function of the doctrine of prejudice is to explain any failure of devoted scientific research by blaming its operatives, or rather the prejudices that pollute their minds, since observers who endorse some theories before they observe see things wrong
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The Function of the Doctrine of Prejudice
The function of the doctrine of prejudice is to explain any failure of devoted scientific research by blaming its operatives, or rather the prejudices that pollute their minds, since observers who endorse some theories before they observe see things wrongly. This is also the explanation of why all the labors of centuries of past research bore less fruit than what Bacon intended to achieve within a few years, or at least within a few generations (Novum Organum, 1, Aph. 178). Indeed, any optimist must have an answer to the obvious question, why was the past so bad when the prospects for the future are so bright? What is the cause of the expected radical change? Some optimists like Leibniz may answer that the past was not so gloomy after all. But no one had a lower opinion of the past than Bacon, who viewed all or almost all past thinkers as sophists of one kind or another. (He even smeared Socrates as pretentious; Works, 4, 412.) Intellectually (not politically) he was a relentless radical who repeatedly demanded in the strongest terms that his followers should completely forget all past intellectual achievements (and remember only unadorned facts). His doctrine of prejudice is the full justification for his radical demand to start afresh.
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Radicalism
Almost everywhere all politics is conservative. The exception is the politics of ancient Greece before Alexander and the modern West. There political thought is split between radicals who want sweeping changes and reactionaries who demand going back to the past. The moderate reforms that most parliaments implemented were always expedient: no arguments in their favor were offered before the twentieth century. Those who wanted reforms usually wanted sweeping reforms. How sweeping? The only answer given to this fundamental question was vague: delete all past institutions, customs, laws; forget the past.
J. Agassi, The Very Idea of Modern Science: Francis Bacon and Robert Boyle, Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science 298, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-5351-8_4, © Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013
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The Function of the Doctrine of Prejudice
The radicalism that philosophers of science advocate is not political but it is the application of political radicalism to thinking: forget past opinions. This is Bacon’s radicalism. His argument for it was his doctrine of prejudice: holding on to old ideas is prejudicial and it blocks the growth of science. Perhaps the most important aspect of the doctrine of prejudice is that by explaining any failure to execute induction it renders the theory of induction (inductivism) irrefutable.1 Whatever the process is, we can ask its advocates to employ their marvelous machine and produce a theory. (Bacon said, he was too busy to do that; Works, 1, 380.) If they manage to produce an interesting theory, and if the theory that they produce is scientific, then we may try to refute it. If we succeed, then the moment the theory is refuted, the hope is shattered that th
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