Francis Bacon

Lawyer, statesman, and philosopher, remains one of the most effectual thinkers in European intellectual history. We can trace his influence from Kant in the 1700s to Darwin a century later.

The Advancement of Learning, first published in 1605, contains an unprecedented and thorough systematization of the whole range of human knowledge. Bacon's argument that the sciences should move away from divine philosophy and embrace empirical observation would forever change the way philosophers and natural scientists interpret their world.