The First Scientist

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The First Scientist - A Life of Roger Bacon

Brian Clegg

Where did science begin?
The First Scientist takes us back to thirteenth-century Europe, to the early years of the great universities, where learning was spiced with the danger of mob violence and a terrifyingly repressive religious censorship. Roger Bacon, a humble and devout English friar, seems an unlikely figure to challenge the orthodoxy of his day – yet this unworldly man risked his life to establish the basis for true scientific knowledge.

Why is Roger Bacon interesting?
Born around 1220, Bacon was passionately interested in the natural world and how things worked. Banned from writing on such dangerous topics by his Order, it was only when a new Pope proved sympathetic that he began compiling his encyclopaedia of knowledge, on everything from optics to alchemy - the synopsis took him a year and ran to 800,000 words, but he was never to complete the work itself. Sadly, the enlightened Pope died before he could read Bacon's remarkable work, and Bacon was tried as a magician and incarcerated for ten years.

"The author’s talent for giving the reader an almost tangible feeling for the atmosphere of 13^th Century Europe in general and of England in particular was marvellous – I found it fascinating" Professor Heinz Wolff

Legend transformed Bacon into a sorcerer, ‘Doctor Mirabilis’, yet he taught that all magic was fraudulent, based on human ability to deceive, and we can recognise today that his books were the first flowering of the scientific knowledge that would transform our world. He advanced the understanding of optics, he demanded a new calendar that prefigured the Gregorian reform, made geographical breakthroughs later used by Columbus, predicted everything from horseless carriages to the telescope, and stressed the importance of mathematics to science, a significance that would not be recognized for 400 years. Yet his biggest contribution was to link science and experiment, to insist that a study of the natural world by observation and exact measurement was the surest foundation for truth.

How can I find out more?
Up to now all the books about Bacon have been academic texts that were frankly less than exciting and readable. But Constable & Robinson in the UK and Carol and Graf in the US have now published the first popular science/biography of Bacon, written by Brian Clegg, author of Light Years, the remarkable journey through man's enduring fascination with light. The First Scientist is available from both Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk.

A page of Bacon's Opus Majus

Reviews of First Scientist
Roger Bacon was a polymath, prepared to think beyond the doctrine of the time, despite being constrained by the by the all pervading influence of religious dogma... The author’s talent for giving the reader an almost tangible feeling for the atmosphere of 13^th Century Europe in general and of England in particular was marvellous – I found it fascinating - Professor Heinz Wolff, founder of the Brunel Institute for Bioengineering and presenter of science-based TV programmes from Great Experiments Which Changed the World to the Great Egg Race.

When science and Bacon occur in the same sentence, the Bacon meant is usually Francis ... Clegg's enthralling book launches Roger Bacon's re-revival. Ray Olson, American Library Association

In providing a readable short account of Bacon's life in the historical context of his time, Mr Clegg has performed a valuable service. The Sunday Telegraph

There is a strong case for Bacon to be given long-merited due... Clegg writes about the medieval world and Bacon's investigations into optics and mathematics with a contemporary liveliness that keeps the story moving. New Scientist

Brian Clegg uncovers the realities of life in a medieval university and friary... both a fascinating biography and a picture of the age. Education on the Internet

The First Scientist published in the UK by Constable & Robinson, ISBN 184119-6185 in February 2003
The First Scientist published in the US by Carroll & Graf, ISBN 07867-11167 in February 2003

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