The Idols

Bacon writes about the four idols in which people view things, the tribe, the cave, the marketplace, and the theater. The idols of the tribe deals with human understanding of the world in general. For example, what people want to believe is true they will. The idols of the cave refer to people forming opinions off certain scientists and beliefs. Sometimes they can compare one thing one another and oversimplify it or think to into it according to Bacon. The idols of the marketplace refers to kinds of words used. Words can be easily confused and mean different things to different people. Lastly, Bacon talks about the idols of the theater. There are three forms of these called false philosophy which includes, the sophistical, empirical, and superstitious view.

I found Bacon’s piece very interesting. I do believe there are different idols in which people could be classified in. I look at the tribe as one seeing and believing what they want; its like an individual. I think the cave is like a group of people. Kind of like the saying, "you are what you hang around". Because one hears and learns from others, they tend to take up the same belief that person does. The marketplace makes me think of advertisement. One is trying to plant their thoughts and idea onto another. However, a person is free to make what they want of certain words, phrases, or ideas. As for theater, I see this false philosophy referring to schooling, work, and then the unknown. For sophistical, its what one learns. However, it is very possible that one may learn a different version of the subject then another leading people to believe one or the other is wrong. The empirical refers to having experiments and getting results but once again this can lead people to come up with different conclusions. As for the superstitious, that is the unknown knowledge people have within themselves but choose not to explore or the infprmation they reject without even giving it a chance. This is how I viewed the piece. I may have looked to much into it but that was what I made out of Bacon’s essay and how I view the four idols. Sometimes, I think people are to narrowminded and won’t accept anything different from what they want it to be.

The idea of expanding one’s horizon would be a good idea. Taking in all possible knowledge, not being judgmental of anything, and then forming your own opinion of that certain case. I personally think that the tribe causes the most trouble because it refers to the individual who usually doesn’t want to accept any view but his or her own. As for the marketplace, Bacon says words can be misinterpreted or defined differently, I look at it like words are just words. One is free to define a word anyway they want they just need to make it clear to another that is their view and that person doesn’t have to agree. The contemporary connection that was given for this piece was freedom of speech. A question asked was does the government take over the parenting roles by banning certain shows, music, and etc. I have a hard time taking a side on this. I think sometimes the government steps in to much but at the same time why do people think they can sing or broadcast certain things and think its ok? The problem doesn’t lie within the government or parents, it lies within the individual themselves. Something went wrong for that person to want to be so explicit in my opinion.