René Descartes (1596 - 1650)
Related: 1600s - dualism - body - mind
Contemporaries: Artemisia Gentileschi - Jacques Callot
Biography
René Descartes (March 31, 1596 – February 11, 1650), also known as Cartesius, worked as a philosopher and mathematician. He is equally notable for both his groundbreaking work in philosophy and mathematics. As the inventor of the Cartesian coordinate system, he formulated the basis of modern geometry (analytic geometry), which in turn influenced the development of modern calculus.
Descartes, sometimes called the founder of modern philosophy and the Father of Modern Mathematics, ranks as one of the most important and influential thinkers in modern western history. He inspired both his contemporaries and later generations of philosophers, leading them to form what we know today as continental rationalism, a philosophical position in 17th and 18th century Europe. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Descartes [Apr 2005]
Books
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Discourse on Method, Meditations on the First Philosophy (1637) - René Descartes
[Amazon.com]
By calling everything into doubt, Descartes laid the foundations of modern philosophy. He deduced that human beings consist of minds and bodies; that these are totally distinct "substances"; that God exists and that He ensures we can trust the evidence of our senses. Ushering in the "scientific revolution" of Galileo and Newton, Descartes' ideas swept aside ancient and medieval traditions of philosophical methods and investigation. --from the publisher
The Discourse on Method is a philosophical and mathematical treatise published by René Descartes in 1637. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse_on_Method [Apr 2006]
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