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Idola specus (singularIdolum specus), normally translated as "Idols of the Cave" (or "Idols of the Den"), is a type of logicalfallacy whereby the peculiar biases of individuals lead them to errors. ThisLatin term was coined by SirFrancis Bacon and used in hisNovum Organum, one of the earliest treatises arguing the case for the logic and method ofmodern science. He described them as deriving from "the peculiar constitution, mental or bodily, of each individual; and also in education, habit, and accident".[1]
Theidola specus areprejudices, by which individuals inappropriately extend norms or tenets that derive his or her own culture and social group, or to his or her own preferences.Racism,sexism and, more generally just "biases" are examples ofidola specus, but the concept goes beyond them to the criticism of all forms of irreflexivesubjectivity or individual predisposition.
The term is one of four such "idols" which represent "idols and false notions which are now in possession of the human understanding, and have taken deep root therein, not only so beset men's minds that truth can hardly find entrance, but even after entrance is obtained, they will again in the very instauration of the sciences meet and trouble us, unless men being forewarned of the danger fortify themselves as far as may be against their assaults".[2]
Besidesidola specus, there are alsoidola tribus (Idols of the Tribe, caused by human nature),idola fori, (Idols of the Market Place, caused by language) andidola theatri (Idols of the Theatre, which are caused by the influence of philosophers).
The Idols of the Cave are the idols of the individual man. For everyone (besides the errors common to human nature in general) has a cave or den of his own, which refracts and discolors the light of nature, owing either to his own proper and peculiar nature; or to his education and conversation with others; or to the reading of books, and the authority of those whom he esteems and admires; or to the differences of impressions, accordingly as they take place in a mind preoccupied and predisposed or in a mind indifferent and settled; or the like. So that the spirit of man (according as it is meted out to different individuals) is in fact a thing variable and full of perturbation, and governed as it were by chance. Whence it was well observed by Heraclitus that men look for sciences in their own lesser worlds, and not in the greater or common world.
— Novum Organum, Aphorism XLII
In more detail, Bacon said that there are a "great number and variety" of idols of the cave but he chooses to select examples which give "the most important caution", and which "have most effect in disturbing the clearness of the understanding".[1] He judged that they "grow for the most part either out of the predominance of a favorite subject, or out of an excessive tendency to compare or to distinguish, or out of partiality for particular ages, or out of the largeness or minuteness of the objects contemplated."[3] Concerning these most important variants he wrote in more detail:
Bacon also drew general advice for more methodical future study of nature, aimed at avoiding the idols of the cave: "generally let every student of nature take this as a rule: that whatever his mind seizes and dwells upon with peculiar satisfaction is to be held in suspicion, and that so much the more care is to be taken in dealing with such questions to keep the understanding even and clear."[3]
