Observations upon Experimental Philosophy

Margaret Cavendish

6 ideas

1. Microscopes distort rather than reveal nature

   Cavendish argues that magnifying lenses do not show the true shape of things. Instead they produce a figure altered by the glass, the light, and the angle, so a louse or a flea seen through a microscope is an artifact of the instrument as much as of the object. Enlarging an image multiplies the chances of misrepresentation. It does not increase accuracy.

2. Self-moving matter with no inert substrate

   Nature consists of a single continuous body blended from animate and inanimate degrees of matter. The animate portions carry motion and order throughout the whole, so change arises from within matter, not from outside it.

3. Every part of matter perceives in its own way

   Perception is not limited to animals or humans. Every part of nature perceives, down to stones and minerals, because all matter has sense and reason in some degree. The kind of perception fits each creature's structure: a stone knows in a stony way, and a human in a human way. Denying knowledge to other beings reflects human arrogance, not evidence.

4. Rational matter guides sensitive matter

   Cavendish divides animate matter into two degrees. Rational matter is purer and freer, and it conceives and designs. Sensitive matter is more laboring, and it works on and patterns the inanimate. Perception happens by patterning: parts of matter copy the figure of an object in themselves. It does not happen by images or particles entering an organ.

5. Reason outranks sense and experiment

   Experiments and sense observation only show the outward surfaces of things, and the senses can be deceived. Speculative reason can reach toward the inner causes and motions of nature. Experimental philosophy should therefore be governed by rational philosophy, not replace it. Knowledge built only on artificial trials of nature confuses the work of art with the work of nature.

6. Art imitates nature but cannot produce it

   Human technique, such as chemical fire, instruments, and dissections, produces hermaphroditic mixtures and forced effects, not nature's own regular productions. What happens under artificial conditions therefore tells us little about how nature normally works. The Royal Society's claim to know nature through manufactured interventions mistakes the manipulated result for the natural original.

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