The phrase "scientia potentia est" is a Latinaphorism meaning "knowledge is power". It is commonly attributed to Sir Francis Bacon, although there is no known occurrence of this precise phrase in Bacon's English or Latin writings. However, the expression "ipsa scientia potestas est" occurs in Bacon's Meditationes Sacrae. The exact phrase "scientia potentia est" was written for the first time in the 1668 version of the workLeviathan by Thomas Hobbes, who was a secretary to Bacon as a young man. The related phrase "sapientia est potentia" is often translated as "wisdom is power".
History
Origins and parallels
The earliest documented occurrence of the phrase "Knowledge is power" is from Imam Ali, as recorded in the tenth-century book Nahj Al-Balagha:
Knowledge is power and it can command obedience. A man of knowledge during his lifetime can make people obey and follow him and he is praised and venerated after his death. Remember that knowledge is a ruler and wealth is its subject.
Another account of this concept is found in the Shahnameh by the Persian poet Ferdowsi who wrote: "Capable is he who is wise". This hemistich is translated to English as "knowledge is power" or "One who has wisdom is powerful". A proverb in practically the same wording is found in Hebrew, in the Biblical Book of Proverbs : גֶּבֶר-חָכָם בַּעוֹז; וְאִישׁ-דַּעַת, מְאַמֶּץ-כֹּחַ. This was translated in the Latin Vulgata as "vir sapiens et fortis est et vir doctus robustus et validus" and in the King James Version, the first English official edition, as "A wise man is strong, a man of knowledge increaseth strength".
Thomas Hobbes
The first known reference of the exact phrase appeared in the Latin edition of Leviathan. This passage from Part 1, Chapter X occurs in a list of various attributes of man which constitute power; in this list, "sciences" or "the sciences" are given a minor position: In the English version this passage reads as thus:
On a later work, De Corpore, also written in Latin, Hobbes expanded the same idea: In Jean Hampton, Hobbes and the social contract tradition, Hampton indicates that this quote is 'after Bacon' and in a footnote, that 'Hobbes was Bacon's secretary as a young man and had philosophical discussions with him.
Francis Bacon
The closest expression in Bacon's works is, perhaps, the expression "ipsa scientia potestas est", found in his , which is translated as "knowledge itself is power": One of many differing English translations of this section includes the following: Interpretation of the notion of power meant by Bacon must therefore take into account his distinction between the power of knowing and the power of working and acting, the opposite of what is assumed when the maxim is taken out of context. Indeed, the quotation has become a cliche. In another place, Bacon wrote, "Human knowledge and human power meet in one; for where the cause is not known the effect cannot be produced. Nature to be commanded must be obeyed; and that which in contemplation is as the cause is in operation as the rule."
wrote in his essay Old Age, included in the collection Society and Solitude :
''Wissen ist Macht'' in Germany
After the 1871, unification of Germany, "Wissen ist Macht, geographisches Wissen ist Weltmacht" was often used in German geography and the public discussion to support efforts for a German colonial empire after 1880. Julius Perthes e.g., used the motto for his publishing house. However, the installation of geographical research followed popular requests and was not imposed by the government. Especially Count Bismarck was not much interested in German colonial adventures; his envoy Gustav Nachtigal started with the first protective areas, but was more interested in ethnological aspects. After World War I, German geography tried to contribute to efforts to regain a world power. Scholars like Karl Haushofer, a former general, and his son Albrecht Haushofer got worldwide attention with their concept of geopolitics. Associations of German geographers and school teachers welcomed the Machtergreifung and hoped to get further influence in the new regime. The postwar geography was much more cautious; concepts of political geography and projection of power had not been widespread scholarly topics until 1989 in Germany. Geographical knowledge is however still of importance in Germany. Germans tend to mock US politicians' and celebrities' comparable lack of interest in the topic. A Sponti version of the slogan is "Wissen ist Macht, nichts wissen, macht auch nichts", a pun about the previous motto along the line "Knowledge is power, but being ignorant doesn't bother anyway". Joschka Fischer and Daniel Cohn-Bendit belong to those Spontis that nevertheless held powerful positions, in Fischer's case with no more formal education than a taxi driver's licence. The German Bundeswehr Bataillon Elektronische Kampfführung 932, an electronic warfare unit based in Frankenberg, still uses the Latin version Scientia potentia est as its motto.
