1 THE 13th INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF ISSEI International Society for the Study of European Ideas in cooperation with the University of Cyprus Bacon’s New Atlantis and the Goals of Modernity Dr. Timothy W. Burns Professor of Government Skidmore College Ladd Hall 316 815 North Broadway Saratoga Springs, NY 12866 tburns@skidmore.edu We live in an age absorbed with technology yet deeply dissatisfied with it, one that is modern and postmodern. I attempt to gain some clarity about our situation by examining the work of one of the founders of modern science and technology, Francis Bacon. I attempt to understand the relation of the two important strands—scientific and political—of his thought. Bacon’s New Atlantis provides us with some important guidance, if not the key, to this relation. I begin with Bacon’s expressed indebtedness to Machiavelli and his employment of three Machiavellian ideas—the form-less-ness of man, the need to conquer fortune, and the need to replace magnanimity with the virtue of “humanity”—as crucial strands in