The affections colour and infect the understanding

Francis Bacon in Novum Organon. Not 2012 but 1620. Nearly four hundred years old and yet you can pick up any magazine or newspaper and see this observation alive and well. Bridled, the affections infecting our understanding is not necessarily a bad thing. It is our "affections" that drive us forwards as implied in the motto of the Britsh RAF, Per Ardua ad Astra; Through Adversity to the Stars. Unbridled and the affections that color and infect our understanding is more akin to a mental virus, darkening our perceptions and spreading cognitive pollution.

The human understanding is no dry light, but receives infusion from the will and affections; whence proceed sciences which may be called 'sciences as one would'. For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes. Therefore he rejects difficult things from impatience of research; sober things, because they narrow hope; the deeper things of nature, from superstition; the light of experience, from arrogance and pride; things not commonly believed, out of deference to the opinion of the vulgar. Numberless in short are the ways, and sometimes imperceptible, in which the affections colour and infect the understanding.