Bacon promised that mechanical arts would conquer and subdue nature

Evidence

Scientific method, combined with mechanical technology, would create a “new organon,” a new system of investigation, that unified knowledge with material power. The technological discoveries of printing, gunpowder, and the magnet in the fields of learning, warfare, and navigation “help us to think about the secrets still locked in nature’s bosom.” “They do not, like the old, merely exert a gentle guidance over nature’s course; they have the power to conquer and subdue her, to shake her to her foundations.” Under the mechanical arts, “nature betrays her secrets more fully … than when in enjoyment of her natural liberty.” — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 683

Categorization

• XREF: Supports the polyad’s central causal narrative: mechanical technology as the instrument that translates the organic cosmos into an exploitable machine. — connects to: Bacon completed the stepmother transformation by urging miners to pry nature’s secrets — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 206; Bacon welded natural magic, mining, and patriarchy into an ethic of nature exploitation. — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 656; Bacon’s program framed nature as a slave to be bound and constrained by science. — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 670 (+7 more)

Broader Connections

• Bacon grounded his entire philosophical project in achieving practical mastery over nature #expands (0.90) — Bertrand Russell, History of Western Philosophy, 1994
• Bacon explicitly outlined engineering artificial plant and animal species #expands (0.85) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 726
• Bacon’s utopia authorized the manipulation of living organisms for experimental gain #expands (0.85) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 732
• Bacon classified nature as free, erring, or bound, justifying constraint of wayward matter #expands (0.85) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 677
• Bacon justified domination of nature as recovering man’s lost right from the Fall #expands (0.80) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 738
• Bacon framed scientific method as the capture and enslavement of a female nature #expands (0.80) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 676