Baconian method

The extent of Boyle’s involvement with alchemy after he left Dorset is still a matter of debate, and Lawrence Principe of Johns Hopkins University has made a persuasive case that Boyle was not so much trying to discard alchemy in favour of what we would now call chemistry, but that he was trying to bring the Baconian method into alchemy—to make alchemy scientific, as it were.

Among the contenders for the method, the Baconian method involved cataloguing many experiences of phenomena, then figuring out how to classify them.

Baconian method, the inductive method.

Based on the Baconian method, it proceeded, modestly and unostentatiously, to ascertain, and then to classify the facts of mind; and, because it projected no splendid theories, or blazing fancies, it has been rejected by superficial and visionary thinkers, with some degree of contempt.

It overthrew the old ideas of science and gave a new meaning to the Baconian method of investigation.