| attempt to reach the truth. They only | retained the deductive and systematic | form of discourse to introduce order | into men's opinions, and maintained | that invention could be reduced to | the mere search for arguments, that | is, for probable reasons invented to | persuade or convince. | | Bacon, however, wants to promote the | idea of an inductive science and | argues that Aristotle's mistake | affects the syllogistic form. In the | fourth chapter of the fifth book of | the DE AUGMENTIS, Bacon develops a | remarkable critique of the syllogism | and is partly responsible for the | widespread disregard of formal logic | in the seventeenth and eighteenth | centuries. | | According to Bacon, "in all | inductions, whether in good or | vicious form the same action of the | mind which inventeth, judgeth" (III, | 392). One cannot find without | proving, nor prove without finding. | But this is not the case in the | syllogism: "for the proof being not | immediate but by mean, the invention | of the mean is one thing, and the | judgement of the consequence is | another, the one exciting only, the | other examining" (III, 392). The | syllogism needs the means (the middle | term) so that the derived conclusion | amounts to a proof. But since the | syllogism is incapable of inventing