1. Why is the historical period of Sir Francis Bacon and his contemporaries often considered to be the dawn of the modern era?

The seventeenth century gave birth to renaissance thinkers and literary paragons alike, with whose works our textbooks are replete some three hundred years later. Writers such as John Donne, Ben Johnson and William Shakespeare are considered to be amongst the Grand Masters of the English language, whose words have been so far reaching they have inspired thinkers in psycology and philosophy, as well as influenced writers of novels poems and screenplays. Sir Isaac Newton created the architechture of phsyics, while dicovering the nature of light and gravitation. Newton and Leibnitz simultaneously discovered (or created?) Calculus, revolutionizing mathematical theory and the human conception of the infinite. It is amongst such men that Bacon emerged. The human conception of the Universe was in radical transition, and Bacon was on the forefront of this fronteir of thought. The modern era is characterized by a faith in the intelligability of nature and a belief that rationality is the tool necessary for its comprehensibility. Such thinking was born in the seventeenth century.

Has the modern mindset impacted our perception of information? What is its relation to postmodernism?

2. How are the ways that Sir Francis Bacon applied deductive and inductive reasoning and the scientific method related to the modern conception of information?

Bacon proposed that induction, as a logical method, was formulating a general conclusion from the observation of specific data. He reasoned that the minds ability to create a general concept from particular occurrances should be the principle method of scientific dicovery. Bacon considered deduction to be an effective tool for argumentation, as in Aristotelian philosophy. One might derive specific truths from a more general axiom. Both of these uses of logic are explioted by the scientific method. One conducts an experiment, collects and scrutinizes the data to finally arrive at a general rule on the operations of nature. This rule may then be applied to formulate further hypotheses in related matters. The dichotomous nature of information is similarly perplexing. It is very specific, but is the foundation for great and sweeping generalizations when viewed compendiously. Moreover, the language of information (binary code) is the most parsimonious and reduced form information may assume. Strings of ones and zero's, or signals of on and off represent much more complex totalities such as graphics, ideas and music. It is as if the computer does the induction by interpreting the data, and the user may deduce further truths from the message conveyed.

Are there any limitations to this creed of thought?

3. What did the concepts involved in Sir Francis Bacon's literature reveal about his perception of the nature of reality?

The New Atlantis provides a depiction of an utopian society based around the potency of knowledge and information. The phrase "knowledge is power" was coined in this polemical novella, and it is the fundemental ideology of the members of the utopian society. The society sent out what were called "merchants of light" to collect information from around the world and bring it back to their covert island. This knowledge was then applied and built upon to control nature. The secrecy of the island and the information it hoarded was central to the functioning of the society. Bacon continually uses language that sets man up against nature in a more conflicting than symbiotic relationship. He speaks of conquering nature and torturing her secrets out of her. It was as if man's great challenge was to uncover the perspicuity of nature. With relation to Bacon's ideas and themes, information is the result of certain understandings of nature, the perspective of reality it conjures is left to the descretion of the interpreter.

Does Bacon's liturature add "humaneness" to his ideas of logical inspection?

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