“ Bacon’s role was to provide a rallying call for the conquest of the unknown — “the enlarging of the bounds of human empire, to the effecting of all things possible” — for which he identified common enemies in evidence-less debate and untested tradition. And with victory he promised miracles”

“The last thing Alain Hodak remembers before his double lung transplant surgery was excitedly waiting in the operating room for a call from a doctor on the roof of the hospital, saying his drone had arrived”