Paterson, T. “The Secular Control of Scientific Power in the Political Philosophy of Francis Bacon,” Polity 21, no. 3 (Spring 1989): 457–80.

Abstract: “This article is a sequel to one published in the Spring 1987 issue of Polity by the same author. The first essay argued that Francis Bacon did not see Christianity as the ultimate  guide of applied science. This essay focuses on the purely secular factors which Bacon thought might serve as such a guide and, in particular, on his apparent suggestion that a power-generating science would be beneficial to mankind because scientists would in the future participate in political rule.  The central argument here is that while any such solution to the problem of the moral and political control of scientific power necessarily rests upon a belief that scientists as scientist will be good men, Bacon’s psychology of the scientist seems to be in profound tension with any such suggestion.  The author concludes that Bacon resolved this tension by finding an amoral substitute for morality in desire of scientists for fame; this purely selfish impulse could lead scientists-rulers of the future to act as if they were in fact the humane and charitable scientist-saints of Baconian legend.”

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