Unnatural Knowledge

Abstract

As self-reflective creatures, we are always fascinated by the origins of ourselves and of our current way of life. In ancient periods, people developed stories of creation, religions, and philosophies to explain the puzzle of our existence. In modern times, historians and social scientists have theorized about them. In so doing, they face a perplexing question: Why did modern science, technology, and economy, as we know them now, only appear in the West during the last five hundred years, but not earlier, and elsewhere?¹

Man, being the servant and interpreter of Nature, can do and understand so much and so much only as he has observed in fact or in thought of the course of nature. Beyond this he neither knows anything nor can do anything.

—Francis Bacon, 1620, The New Organon