How Engineers Kick-Started the Scientific Method

In 1627, a year after the death of the philosopher and statesman Francis Bacon, a short, evocative tale of his was published. The New Atlantis describes how a ship blown off course arrives at an unknown island called Bensalem. At its heart stands Salomon’s House, an institution devoted to “the knowledge of causes, and secret motions of things” and to “the effecting of all things possible.” The novel captured Bacon’s vision of a science built on skepticism and empiricism and his belief that understanding and creating were one and the same pursuit. No mere scholar’s study filled with curiosities, Salomon’s House had deep-sunk caves for refrigeration, towering structures for astronomy, sound-houses for acoustics, engine-houses, and optical perspective-houses. Its inhabitants bore titles that still sound futuristic: Merchants of Light, Pioneers, Compilers, and Interpreters of Nature. Engraved title page of The Advancement and Proficience of LearningPublic DomainBacon didn