René Descartes

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René Descartes
Frans Hals - Portret van René Descartes.jpg
Portrait after Frans Hals, 1648[1]
Born (1596-03-31)31 March 1596
La Haye en Touraine, Kingdom of France
Died 11 February 1650(1650-02-11) (aged 53)
Stockholm, Swedish Empire
Nationality French
Religion Catholic[2]
Era 17th-century philosophy
Region Western Philosophy
School Cartesianism, rationalism, foundationalism, founder of Cartesianism
Main interests metaphysics, epistemology, mathematics
Notable ideas Cogito ergo sum, method of doubt, method of normals, Cartesian coordinate system, Cartesian dualism, ontological argument for the existence of God, mathesis universalis;
folium of Descartes
Influences
Influenced
Signature Firma Descartes.svg
Engraving of Descartes
Part of a series on
René Descartes
Cartesianism · Rationalism
Foundationalism
Doubt and certainty
Dream argument
Cogito ergo sum
Trademark argument
Causal adequacy principle
Mind–body dichotomy
Analytic geometry
Coordinate system
Cartesian circle · Folium
Rule of signs · Cartesian diver
Balloonist theory
Wax argument
Res cogitans · Res extensa
Works
The World
Discourse on the Method
La Géométrie
Meditations on First Philosophy
Principles of Philosophy
Passions of the Soul
People
Christina, Queen of Sweden
Baruch Spinoza
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
Francine Descartes

René Descartes (/ˈdeɪˌkɑrt/;[5] French: [ʁəne dekaʁt]; Latinized: Renatus Cartesius; adjectival form: "Cartesian";[6] 31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650) was a French philosopher, mathematician and writer who spent most of his life in the Dutch Republic. He has been dubbed the father of modern philosophy, and much subsequent Western philosophy is a response to his writings,[7][8] which are studied closely to this day. In particular, his Meditations on First Philosophy continues to be a standard text at most university philosophy departments. Descartes' influence in mathematics is equally apparent; the Cartesian coordinate system — allowing reference to a point in space as a set of numbers, and allowing algebraic equations to be expressed as geometric shapes in a two-dimensional coordinate system (and conversely, shapes to be described as equations) — was named after him. He is credited as the father of analytical geometry, the bridge between algebra and geometry, crucial to the discovery of infinitesimal calculus and analysis. Descartes was also one of the key figures in the scientific revolution and has been described as an example of genius. He refused to accept the authority of previous philosophers, and refused to trust his own senses. Descartes frequently sets his views apart from those of his predecessors. In the opening section of the Passions of the Soul, a treatise on the early modern version of what are now commonly called emotions, Descartes goes so far as to assert that he will write on this topic "as if no one had written on these matters before". Many elements of his philosophy have precedents in late Aristotelianism, the revived Stoicism of the 16th century, or in earlier philosophers like Augustine. In his natural philosophy, he differs from the schools on two major points: First, he rejects the splitting of corporeal substance into matter and form; second, he rejects any appeal to final ends—divine or natural—in explaining natural phenomena.[9] In his theology, he insists on the absolute freedom of God's act of creation.

Descartes laid the foundation for 17th-century continental rationalism, later advocated by Baruch Spinoza and Gottfried Leibniz, and opposed by the empiricist school of thought consisting of Hobbes, Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. Leibniz, Spinoza and Descartes were all well versed in mathematics as well as philosophy, and Descartes and Leibniz contributed greatly to science as well.

He is perhaps best known for the philosophical statement "Cogito ergo sum" (French: Je pense, donc je suis; I think, therefore I am), found in part IV of Discourse on the Method (1637 – written in French but with inclusion of "Cogito ergo sum") and §7 of part I of Principles of Philosophy (1644 – written in Latin).

Early life[edit]

Graduation registry for Descartes at the Collège Royal Henry-Le-Grand, La Flèche, 1616

Descartes was born in La Haye en Touraine (now Descartes), Indre-et-Loire, France. When he was one year old, his mother Jeanne Brochard died. His father Joachim was a member of the Parlement of Brittany at Rennes.[10] In 1606 or 1607 he entered the Jesuit Collège Royal Henry-Le-Grand at La Flèche[11] where he was introduced to mathematics and physics, including Galileo's work.[12] After graduation in December 1616, he studied at the University of Poitiers, earning a Baccalauréat and Licence in law, in accordance with his father's wishes that he should become a lawyer.[13]

In his book, Discourse On The Method, he says "I entirely abandoned the study of letters. Resolving to seek no knowledge other than that of which could be found in myself or else in the great book of the world, I spent the rest of my youth traveling, visiting courts and armies, mixing with people of diverse temperaments and ranks, gathering various experiences, testing myself in the situations which fortune offered me, and at all times reflecting upon whatever came my way so as to derive some profit from it."

Given his ambition to become a professional military officer, in 1618, Descartes joined the Army of Breda under the command of Maurice of Nassau in the Dutch Republic, and undertook a formal study of military engineering, as established by Simon Stevin. Descartes therefore received much encouragement in Breda to advance his knowledge of mathematics.[14] In this way he became acquainted with Isaac Beeckman, principal of Dordrecht school. Beeckman had proposed a difficult mathematical problem, and to his astonishment, it was the young Descartes who found the solution. Both believed that it was necessary to create a method that thoroughly linked mathematics and physics.[15] While in the service of the Duke Maximilian of Bavaria, Descartes was present at the Battle of the White Mountain outside Prague, in November 1620.[16]

Visions[edit]

On the night of 10–11 November 1619, while stationed in Neuburg an der Donau, Germany, Descartes shut himself in an "oven" (probably a Kachelofen or masonry heater) to escape the cold. While within, he had three visions and believed that a divine spirit revealed to him a new philosophy. Upon exiting he had formulated analytical geometry and the idea of applying the mathematical method to philosophy. He concluded from these visions that the pursuit of science would prove to be, for him, the pursuit of true wisdom and a central part of his life's work.[17][18] Descartes also saw very clearly that all truths were linked with one another, so that finding a fundamental truth and proceeding with logic would open the way to all science. This basic truth, Descartes found quite soon: his famous "I think therefore I am".[15]

In 1622, he returned to France, and during the next few years spent time in Paris and other parts of Europe. It was during a stay in Paris that he composed his first essay on method: Regulae ad Directionem Ingenii (Rules for the Direction of the Mind).[15] He arrived in La Haye in 1623, selling all of his property to invest in bonds, which provided a comfortable income for the rest of his life. Descartes was present at the siege of La Rochelle by Cardinal Richelieu in 1627. In the fall of the same year, in the residence of the papal nuncio Guidi di Bagno, where he came with Mersenne and many other scholars to listen to a lecture given by the alchemist Monsieur de Chandoux on the principles of a supposed new philosophy,[19] Cardinal Bérulle urged him to write an exposition of his own new philosophy.

Work[edit]

He returned to the Dutch Republic in 1629, where he lived until September 1649. In April 1629 he joined the University of Franeker, living at the Sjaerdemaslot, and the next year, under the name "Poitevin", he enrolled at the Leiden University to study mathematics with Jacob Golius and astronomy with Martin Hortensius.[20] In October 1630 he had a falling-out with Beeckman, whom he accused of plagiarizing some of his ideas. In Amsterdam, he had a relationship with a servant girl, Helena Jans van der Strom, with whom he had a daughter, Francine, who was born in 1635 in Deventer, at which time Descartes taught at the Utrecht University. Francine Descartes died in 1640 in Amersfoort, from Scarlet Fever. Unlike many moralists of the time, Descartes was not devoid of passions but rather defended them; he wept upon her death.[21]

While in the Netherlands he changed his address frequently, living among other places in Dordrecht (1628), Franeker (1629), Amsterdam (1629–30), Leiden (1630), Amsterdam (1630–32), Deventer (1632–34), Amsterdam (1634–35), Utrecht (1635–36), Leiden (1636), Egmond (1636–38), Santpoort (1638–1640), Leiden (1640–41), Endegeest (a castle near Oegstgeest) (1641–43), and finally for an extended time in Egmond-Binnen (1643–49).

Despite these frequent moves he wrote all his major work during his 20-plus years in the Netherlands, where he managed to revolutionize mathematics and philosophy. In 1633, Galileo was condemned by the Catholic Church, and Descartes abandoned plans to publish Treatise on the World, his work of the previous four years. Nevertheless, in 1637 he published part of this work in three essays: Les Météores (The Meteors), La Dioptrique (Dioptrics) and La Géométrie (Geometry), preceded by an introduction, his famous Discours de la méthode (Discourse on the Method). In it Descartes lays out four rules of thought, meant to ensure that our knowledge rests upon a firm foundation.

René Descartes (right) with Queen Christina of Sweden (left).

Descartes continued to publish works concerning both mathematics and philosophy for the rest of his life. In 1641 he published a metaphysics work, Meditationes de Prima Philosophia (Meditations on First Philosophy), written in Latin and thus addressed to the learned. It was followed, in 1644, by Principia Philosophiæ (Principles of Philosophy), a kind of synthesis of the Meditations and the Discourse. In 1643, Cartesian philosophy was condemned at the University of Utrecht, and Descartes began his long correspondence with Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia, devoted mainly to moral and psychological subjects. Connected with this correspondence, in 1649 he published Les Passions de l'âme (Passions of the Soul), that he dedicated to the Princess. In 1647, he was awarded a pension by the King of France, though it was never paid.[22] Descartes was interviewed by Frans Burman at Egmond-Binnen in 1648.

A French translation of Principia Philosophiæ, prepared by Abbot Claude Picot, was published in 1647. This edition Descartes dedicated to Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia. In the preface Descartes praised true philosophy as a means to attain wisdom. He identifies four ordinary sources to reach wisdom, and finally says that there is a fifth, better and more secure, consisting in the search for first causes.[23]

Death[edit]

René Descartes died on 11 February 1650 in Stockholm, Sweden, while a guest at the house of the French ambassador. He had been invited by Queen Christina of Sweden to tutor her. The cause of death was said to be pneumonia. Accustomed to working in bed until noon, he may have suffered damage to his health from Christina's study regime, which began early in the morning at 5 a.m. His lack of sleep could have severely compromised his immune system. In 1991, a German scholar published a book questioning this account and more arguments against its veracity have been raised since.[24]

On the other hand, he might have been assassinated.[25] After Descartes' death, Queen Christina abdicated her throne to convert to Catholicism as Swedish law requires a Protestant ruler. The only Catholic with whom she had prolonged contact had been Descartes.[26]

In 1663, the Pope placed his works on the Index of Prohibited Books.

The tomb of Descartes (middle, with detail of the inscription), in the Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, Paris

As a Catholic in a Protestant nation, he was interred in a graveyard used mainly for unbaptized infants in Adolf Fredriks kyrka in Stockholm. Later, his remains were taken to France and buried in the Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés in Paris. Although the National Convention in 1792 had planned to transfer his remains to the Panthéon, they are, two centuries later, still resting between two other graves – those of the scholarly monks Jean Mabillon and Bernard de Montfaucon — in a chapel of the abbey. His memorial, erected in the 18th century, remains in the Swedish church.

Religious beliefs[edit]

The religious beliefs of René Descartes have been rigorously debated within scholarly circles. He claimed to be a devout Catholic, saying that one of the purposes of the Meditations was to defend the Christian faith, although his reasoning for being Catholic could be because he "preferred to avoid all collision with ecclesiastical authority."[27] However, in his own era, Descartes was accused of harboring secret deist or atheist beliefs. His contemporary Blaise Pascal said that "I cannot forgive Descartes; in all his philosophy, Descartes did his best to dispense with God. But Descartes could not avoid prodding God to set the world in motion with a snap of his lordly fingers; after that, he had no more use for God."[28] Stephen Gaukroger's biography of Descartes reports that "he had a deep religious faith as a Catholic, which he retained to his dying day, along with a resolute, passionate desire to discover the truth."[29] The debate continues whether Descartes was a Catholic/Christian apologist, or a deist/atheist concealed behind pious sentiments who placed the world on a mechanistic framework, within which only man could freely move due to the grace of will granted by God.[22]

Philosophical work[edit]

Further information: Cartesianism

Descartes is often regarded as the first thinker to emphasize the use of reason to develop the natural sciences.[30] For him the philosophy was a thinking system that embodied all knowledge, and expressed it in this way:[31]

In his Discourse on the Method, he attempts to arrive at a fundamental set of principles that one can know as true without any doubt. To achieve this, he employs a method called hyperbolical/metaphysical doubt, also sometimes referred to as methodological skepticism: he rejects any ideas that can be doubted, and then reestablishes them in order to acquire a firm foundation for genuine knowledge.[32]

Initially, Descartes arrives at only a single principle: thought exists. Thought cannot be separated from me, therefore, I exist (Discourse on the Method and Principles of Philosophy). Most famously, this is known as cogito ergo sum (English: "I think, therefore I am"). Therefore, Descartes concluded, if he doubted, then something or someone must be doing the doubting, therefore the very fact that he doubted proved his existence. "The simple meaning of the phrase is that if one is skeptical of existence, that is in and of itself proof that he does exist."[33]

René Descartes at work

Descartes concludes that he can be certain that he exists because he thinks. But in what form? He perceives his body through the use of the senses; however, these have previously been unreliable. So Descartes determines that the only indubitable knowledge is that he is a thinking thing. Thinking is what he does, and his power must come from his essence. Descartes defines "thought" (cogitatio) as "what happens in me such that I am immediately conscious of it, insofar as I am conscious of it". Thinking is thus every activity of a person of which the person is immediately conscious.[34]

To further demonstrate the limitations of these senses, Descartes proceeds with what is known as the Wax Argument. He considers a piece of wax; his senses inform him that it has certain characteristics, such as shape, texture, size, color, smell, and so forth. When he brings the wax towards a flame, these characteristics change completely. However, it seems that it is still the same thing: it is still the same piece of wax, even though the data of the senses inform him that all of its characteristics are different. Therefore, in order to properly grasp the nature of the wax, he should put aside the senses. He must use his mind. Descartes concludes:

In this manner, Descartes proceeds to construct a system of knowledge, discarding perception as unreliable and instead admitting only deduction as a method. In the third and fifth Meditation, he offers an ontological proof of a benevolent God (through both the ontological argument and trademark argument). Because God is benevolent, he can have some faith in the account of reality his senses provide him, for God has provided him with a working mind and sensory system and does not desire to deceive him. From this supposition, however, he finally establishes the possibility of acquiring knowledge about the world based on deduction and perception. In terms of epistemology therefore, he can be said to have contributed such ideas as a rigorous conception of foundationalism and the possibility that reason is the only reliable method of attaining knowledge. He, nevertheless, was very much aware that experimentation was necessary in order to verify and validate theories.[31]

Descartes also wrote a response to External world scepticism. He argues that sensory perceptions come to him involuntarily, and are not willed by him. They are external to his senses, and according to Descartes, this is evidence of the existence of something outside of his mind, and thus, an external world. Descartes goes on to show that the things in the external world are material by arguing that God would not deceive him as to the ideas that are being transmitted, and that God has given him the "propensity" to believe that such ideas are caused by material things. Although he put forth the dream argument and also put forth the argument that rather it could have been an evil demon who has put forth an illusory external world to his senses.

Dualism[edit]

Further information: Mind-body dichotomy and dualism

Descartes in his Passions of the Soul and The Description of the Human Body suggested that the body works like a machine, that it has material properties. The mind (or soul), on the other hand, was described as a nonmaterial and does not follow the laws of nature. Descartes argued that the mind interacts with the body at the pineal gland. This form of dualism or duality proposes that the mind controls the body, but that the body can also influence the otherwise rational mind, such as when people act out of passion. Most of the previous accounts of the relationship between mind and body had been uni-directional.

Descartes suggested that the pineal gland is "the seat of the soul" for several reasons. First, the soul is unitary, and unlike many areas of the brain the pineal gland appeared to be unitary (though subsequent microscopic inspection has revealed it is formed of two hemispheres). Second, Descartes observed that the pineal gland was located near the ventricles. He believed the cerebrospinal fluid of the ventricles acted through the nerves to control the body, and that the pineal gland influenced this process. Sensations delivered by the nerves to the pineal, he believed, caused it to vibrate in some sympathetic manner, which in turn gave rise to the emotions and caused the body to act.[22] Cartesian dualism set the agenda for philosophical discussion of the mind–body problem for many years after Descartes' death.[35]

In present day discussions on the practice of animal vivisection, it is normal to consider Descartes as an advocate of this practice, as a result of his dualistic philosophy. Some of the sources say that Descartes denied the animals could feel pain, and therefore could be used without concern.[36] Other sources consider that Descartes denied that animals had reason or intelligence, but did not lack sensations or perceptions, but these could be explained mechanistically.[37]

Descartes' moral philosophy[edit]

For Descartes, ethics was a science, the highest and most perfect of them. Like the rest of the sciences, ethics had its roots in metaphysics.[31] In this way he argues for the existence of God, investigates the place of man in nature, formulates the theory of mind-body dualism, and defends free will. However, as he was a convinced rationalist, Descartes clearly states that reason is sufficient in the search for the goods that we should seek, and virtue consists in the correct reasoning that should guide our actions. Nevertheless, the quality of this reasoning depends on knowledge, because a well-informed mind will be more capable of making good choices, and it also depends on mental condition. For this reason he said that a complete moral philosophy should include the study of the body. He discussed this subject in the correspondence with Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia, and as a result wrote his work The Passions of the Soul, that contains a study of the psychosomatic processes and reactions in man, with an emphasis on emotions or passions.[38]

Humans should seek the sovereign good that Descartes, following Zeno, identifies with virtue, as this produces a solid blessedness or pleasure. For Epicurus the sovereign good was pleasure, and Descartes says that in fact this is not in contradiction with Zeno's teaching, because virtue produces a spiritual pleasure, that is better than bodily pleasure. Regarding Aristotle's opinion that happiness depends on the goods of fortune, Descartes does not deny that this good contributes to happiness, but remarks that they are in great proportion outside one's own control, whereas one's mind is under one's complete control.[38]

The moral writings of Descartes came at the last part of his life, but earlier, in his Discourse on Method he adopted three maxims to be able to act while he put all his ideas into doubt. This is known as his "Provisional Morals".

Historical impact[edit]

Cover of Meditations.

Emancipation from Church doctrine[edit]

Descartes has been often dubbed as the father of modern Western philosophy, the philosopher that with his skeptic approach has profoundly changed the course of Western philosophy and set the basis for modernity.[7][39] The first two of his Meditations on First Philosophy, those that formulate the famous methodic doubt, represent the portion of Descartes' writings that most influenced modern thinking.[40] It has been argued that Descartes himself didn't realize the extent of his revolutionary gesture.[41] In shifting the debate from "what is true" to "of what can I be certain?," Descartes shifted the authoritative guarantor of truth from God to humanity. (While the traditional concept of "truth" implies an external authority, "certainty" instead relies on the judgment of the individual.) In an anthropocentric revolution, the human being is now raised to the level of a subject, an agent, an emancipated being equipped with autonomous reason. This was a revolutionary step that posed the basis of modernity, the repercussions of which are still ongoing: the emancipation of humanity from Christian revelational truth and Church doctrine, a person who makes her own law and takes her own stand.[42][43][44] In modernity, the guarantor of truth is not God anymore but human beings, each of whom is a "self-conscious shaper and guarantor" of their own reality.[45][46] In that way, each person is turned into a reasoning adult, a subject, and agent,[45] as opposed to a child obedient to God. This change in perspective was characteristic of the shift from the Christian medieval period to the modern period; that shift had been anticipated in other fields, and now Descartes was giving it a formulation in the field of philosophy.[45][47]

This anthropocentric perspective, establishing human reason as autonomous, provided the basis for the Enlightenment's emancipation from God and the Church. It also provided the basis for all subsequent anthropology.[48] Descartes' philosophical revolution is sometimes said to have sparked modern anthropocentrism and subjectivism.[7][49][50][51]

Mathematical legacy[edit]

A Cartesian coordinates graph, using his invented x and y axes.

One of Descartes' most enduring legacies was his development of Cartesian or analytic geometry, which uses algebra to describe geometry. He "invented the convention of representing unknowns in equations by x, y, and z, and knowns by a, b, and c". He also "pioneered the standard notation" that uses superscripts to show the powers or exponents; for example, the 4 used in x4 to indicate squaring of squaring.[52][53] He was first to assign a fundamental place for algebra in our system of knowledge, and believed that algebra was a method to automate or mechanize reasoning, particularly about abstract, unknown quantities. European mathematicians had previously viewed geometry as a more fundamental form of mathematics, serving as the foundation of algebra. Algebraic rules were given geometric proofs by mathematicians such as Pacioli, Cardan, Tartaglia and Ferrari. Equations of degree higher than the third were regarded as unreal, because a three-dimensional form, such as a cube, occupied the largest dimension of reality. Descartes professed that the abstract quantity a2 could represent length as well as an area. This was in opposition to the teachings of mathematicians, such as Vieta, who argued that it could represent only area. Although Descartes did not pursue the subject, he preceded Leibniz in envisioning a more general science of algebra or "universal mathematics," as a precursor to symbolic logic, that could encompass logical principles and methods symbolically, and mechanize general reasoning.[54]

Descartes' work provided the basis for the calculus developed by Newton and Gottfried Leibniz, who applied infinitesimal calculus to the tangent line problem, thus permitting the evolution of that branch of modern mathematics.[55] His rule of signs is also a commonly used method to determine the number of positive and negative roots of a polynomial.

Descartes discovered an early form of the law of conservation of mechanical momentum (a measure of the motion of an object), and envisioned it as pertaining to motion in a straight line, as opposed to perfect circular motion, as Galileo had envisioned it. He outlined his views on the universe in his Principles of Philosophy.

Descartes also made contributions to the field of optics. He showed by using geometric construction and the law of refraction (also known as Descartes' law or more commonly Snell's law, who discovered it 16 years earlier) that the angular radius of a rainbow is 42 degrees (i.e., the angle subtended at the eye by the edge of the rainbow and the ray passing from the sun through the rainbow's centre is 42°).[56] He also independently discovered the law of reflection, and his essay on optics was the first published mention of this law.[57]

Contemporary reception[edit]

Although Descartes was well known in academic circles towards the end of his life, the teaching of his works in schools was controversial. Henri de Roy (Henricus Regius, 1598–1679), Professor of Medicine at the University of Utrecht, was condemned by the Rector of the University, Gijsbert Voet (Voetius), for teaching Descartes' physics.[58]

Writings[edit]

Handwritten letter by Descartes, December 1638.
  • 1618. Musicae Compendium. A treatise on music theory and the aesthetics of music written for Descartes' early collaborator, Isaac Beeckman (first posthumous edition 1650).
  • 1626–1628. Regulae ad directionem ingenii (Rules for the Direction of the Mind). Incomplete. First published posthumously in Dutch translation in 1684 and in the original Latin at Amsterdam in 1701 (R. Des-Cartes Opuscula Posthuma Physica et Mathematica). The best critical edition, which includes the Dutch translation of 1684, is edited by Giovanni Crapulli (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1966).
  • 1630–1631. La recherche de la vérité par la lumière naturelle (The Search for Truth) unfinished dialogue published in 1701.
  • 1630–1633. Le Monde (The World) and L'Homme (Man). Descartes' first systematic presentation of his natural philosophy. Man was published posthumously in Latin translation in 1662; and The World posthumously in 1664.
  • 1637. Discours de la méthode (Discourse on the Method). An introduction to the Essais, which include the Dioptrique, the Météores and the Géométrie.
  • 1637. La Géométrie (Geometry). Descartes' major work in mathematics. There is an English translation by Michael Mahoney (New York: Dover, 1979).
  • 1641. Meditationes de prima philosophia (Meditations on First Philosophy), also known as Metaphysical Meditations. In Latin; a French translation, probably done without Descartes' supervision, was published in 1647. Includes six Objections and Replies. A second edition, published the following year, included an additional objection and reply, and a Letter to Dinet.
  • 1644. Principia philosophiae (Principles of Philosophy), a Latin textbook at first intended by Descartes to replace the Aristotelian textbooks then used in universities. A French translation, Principes de philosophie by Claude Picot, under the supervision of Descartes, appeared in 1647 with a letter-preface to Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia.
  • 1647. Notae in programma (Comments on a Certain Broadsheet). A reply to Descartes' one-time disciple Henricus Regius.
  • 1648. La description du corps humaine (The Description of the Human Body). Published posthumously by Clerselier in 1667.
  • 1648. Responsiones Renati Des Cartes... (Conversation with Burman). Notes on a Q&A session between Descartes and Frans Burman on 16 April 1648. Rediscovered in 1895 and published for the first time in 1896. An annotated bilingual edition (Latin with French translation), edited by Jean-Marie Beyssade, was published in 1981 (Paris: PUF).
  • 1649. Les passions de l'âme (Passions of the Soul). Dedicated to Princess Elisabeth of the Palatinate.
  • 1657. Correspondance. Published by Descartes' literary executor Claude Clerselier. The third edition, in 1667, was the most complete; Clerselier omitted, however, much of the material pertaining to mathematics.

In January 2010, a previously unknown letter from Descartes, dated 27 May 1641, was found by the Dutch philosopher Erik-Jan Bos when browsing through Google. Bos found the letter mentioned in a summary of autographs kept by Haverford College in Haverford, Pennsylvania. The College was unaware that the letter had never been published. This was the third letter by Descartes found in the last 25 years.[59][60]

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. Jump up ^ Russell Shorto (2008). "Descartes' Bones". Doubleday. p. 218.  see also The Louvre, Atlas Database
  2. Jump up ^ "René Descartes". Newadvent.org. Retrieved 30 May 2012. "...preferred to avoid all collision with ecclesiastical authority." 
  3. Jump up ^ Marenbon, John (2007). Medieval Philosophy: an historical and philosophical introduction. Routledge. p. 174. ISBN 978-0-415-28113-3. 
  4. Jump up ^ Étienne Gilson argued in La Liberté chez Descartes et la Théologie (Alcan, 1913, pp. 132–47) that Duns Scotus was not the source of Descartes' Voluntarism. Although there exist doctrinal differences between Descartes and Scotus "it is still possible to view Descartes as borrowing from a Scotist Voluntarist tradition" (see: John Schuster, Descartes-Agonistes: Physcio-mathematics, Method & Corpuscular-Mechanism 1618–33, Springer, 2012, p. 363, fn. 26).
  5. Jump up ^ "Descartes" entry in Collins English Dictionary, HarperCollins Publishers, 1998.
  6. Jump up ^ Colie, Rosalie L. (1957). Light and Enlightenment. Cambridge University Press. p. 58. 
  7. ^ Jump up to: a b c Bertrand Russell (2004) History of western philosophy pp.511, 516–7
  8. Jump up ^ Watson, Richard A. (31 March 2012). "René Descartes". Encyclopædia Britannica (Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc). Retrieved 31 March 2012. 
  9. Jump up ^ Carlson, Neil R. (2001). Physiology of Behavior. Needham Heights, Massachusetts: Pearson: Allyn & Bacon. p. 8. ISBN 0-205-30840-6. 
  10. Jump up ^ Rodis-Lewis, Geneviève (1992). "Descartes' life and the development of his philosophy". In Cottingham, John. The Cambridge Companion to Descartes. Cambridge University Press. p. 22. ISBN 978-0-521-36696-0. 
  11. Jump up ^ Desmond, p. 24
  12. Jump up ^ Porter, Roy (1999) [1997]. "The New Science". The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of Humanity from Antiquity to the Present (paperback edition, 135798642 ed.). Great Britain: Harper Collins. p. 217. ISBN 0006374549. 
  13. Jump up ^ Baird, Forrest E.; Walter Kaufmann (2008). From Plato to Derrida. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Prentice Hall. pp. 373–377. ISBN 0-13-158591-6. 
  14. Jump up ^ "René Descartes". FamousScientists.org. Retrieved 15 December 2011. 
  15. ^ Jump up to: a b c Guy Durandin, Les Principes de la Philosophie. Introduction et notes, Librairie Philosophique J. Vrin, Paris, 1970.
  16. Jump up ^ Battle of White Mountain, Britannica Online Encyclopedia
  17. Jump up ^ Durant, Will; Durant, Ariel (1961). The Story of Civilization: Part VII, the Age of Reason Begins. New York: Simon and Schuster. p. 637. ISBN 0-671-01320-3. 
  18. Jump up ^ Clarke, Desmond (2006). Descartes: A biography. Cambridge University Press. pp. 58–59. ISBN 9781139449847. 
  19. Jump up ^ Nicolas de Villiers, sieur de Chandoux, Lettres sur l'or potable suivies du traité De la connaissance des vrais principes de la nature et des mélanges et de fragments d'un Commentaire sur l'Amphithéâtre de la Sapience éternelle de Khunrath, Textes édités et présentés par Sylvain Matton avec des études de Xavier Kieft et de Simone Mazauric. Préface de Vincent Carraud, Paris, 2013.
  20. Jump up ^ A.C. Grayling, Descartes: The Life of René Descartes and Its Place in His Times, Simon and Schuster, 2006, pp 151–152
  21. Jump up ^ Durant, Will and Ariel (1961). The Story of Civilization: Par VII, the Age of reason Begins. New York: Simon and Schuster. p. 638. ISBN 0-671-01320-3. 
  22. ^ Jump up to: a b c Descartes, René. (2009). Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica 2009 Deluxe Edition. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica.
  23. Jump up ^ Blom, John J., Descartes. His Moral Philosophy and Psychology. New York University Press, 1978. ISBN 0-8147-0999-0
  24. Jump up ^ see Pies Е., Der Mordfall Descartes, Köln, 1991, and Ebert Т., Der rätselhafte Tod des René Descartes, Verlag: Alibri, 2009.
  25. Jump up ^ "Descartes was "poisoned by Catholic priest" – The Guardian, Feb 14 2010". The Guardian. Retrieved 8 October 2014. 
  26. Jump up ^ Smith, Kurt (Fall 2010). "Descartes' Life and Works". The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 
  27. Jump up ^ "René Descartes". Newadvent.org. Retrieved 30 May 2012. "...preferred to avoid all collision with ecclesiastical authority." 
  28. Jump up ^ Think Exist on Blaise Pascal. Retrieved 12 February 2009.
  29. Jump up ^ The Religious Affiliation of philosopher and mathematician René Descartes. Webpage last modified 5 October 2005.
  30. Jump up ^ Emily Grosholz (1991). Cartesian method and the problem of reduction. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-824250-6. "But contemporary debate has tended to...understand [Cartesian method] merely as the 'method of doubt'...I want to define Descartes' method in broader terms...to trace its impact on the domains of mathematics and physics as well as metaphysics." 
  31. ^ Jump up to: a b c René Descartes; Translator John Veitch. "Letter of the Author to the French Translator of the Principles of Philosophy serving for a preface". Retrieved December 2011. 
  32. Jump up ^ Copenhaver, Rebecca. "Forms of skepticism". Archived from the original on 8 January 2005. Retrieved 15 August 2007. 
  33. Jump up ^ "Ten books: Chosen by Raj Persuade". The British Journal of Psychiatry. 
  34. Jump up ^ Descartes, René (1644). The Principles of Philosophy (IX). 
  35. Jump up ^ Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online): Descartes and the Pineal Gland.
  36. Jump up ^ Richard Dawkins (June 2012). "Richard Dawkins on vivisection: "But can they suffer?". Boingboing. Retrieved 2 July 2012. 
  37. Jump up ^ "Animal Consciousness, No. 2. Historical background". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Dec 1995/rev Oct 2010. Retrieved 2 July 2012.  Check date values in: |date= (help)
  38. ^ Jump up to: a b Blom, John J., Descartes. His moral philosophy and psychology. New York University Press. 1978. ISBN 0-8147-0999-0
  39. Jump up ^ Heidegger [1938] (2002) p.76 quotation:

    Descartes... that which he himself founded... modern (and that means, at the same time, Western) metaphysics.

  40. Jump up ^ Schmaltz, Tad M. Radical Cartesianism: The French Reception of Descartes p.27 quotation:

    The Descartes most familiar to twentieth-century philosophers is the Descartes of the first two Meditations, someone proccupied with hyperbolic doubt of the material world and the certainty of knowledge of the self that emerges from the famous cogito argument.

  41. Jump up ^ Roy Wood Sellars (1949) Philosophy for the future: the quest of modern materialism quotation:

    Husserl has taken Descartes very seriously in a historical as well as in a systematic sense [...] [in The Crisis of the European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology, Husserl] finds in the first two Meditations of Descartes a depth which it is difficult to fathom, and which Descartes himself was so little able to appreciate that he let go "the great discovery" he had in his hands.

  42. Jump up ^ Martin Heidegger [1938] (2002) The Age of the World Picture quotation:

    For up to Descartes...a particular sub-iectum...lies at the foundation of its own fixed qualities and changing circumstances. The superiority of a sub-iectum...arises out of the claim of man to a...self-supported, unshakeable foundation of truth, in the sense of certainty. Why and how does this claim acquire its decisive authority? The claim originates in that emancipation of man in which he frees himself from obligation to Christian revelational truth and Church doctrine to a legislating for himself that takes its stand upon itself.

  43. Jump up ^ Ingraffia, Brian D. (1995) Postmodern theory and biblical theology: vanquishing God's shadow p.126
  44. Jump up ^ Norman K. Swazo (2002) Crisis theory and world order: Heideggerian reflections pp.97–9
  45. ^ Jump up to: a b c Lovitt, Tom (1977) introduction to Martin Heidegger's The question concerning technology, and other essays, pp.xxv-xxvi
  46. Jump up ^ Briton, Derek The modern practice of adult education: a postmodern critique p.76
  47. Jump up ^ Martin Heidegger The Word of Nietzsche: God is Dead pp.88–90
  48. Jump up ^ Heidegger [1938] (2002) p.75 quotation:

    With the interpretation of man as subiectum, Descartes creates the metaphysical presupposition for future anthropology of every kind and tendency.

  49. Jump up ^ Benjamin Isadore Schwart China and Other Matters p.95 quotation:

    ... the kind of anthropocentric subjectivism which has emerged from the Cartesian revolution.

  50. Jump up ^ Charles B. Guignon Heidegger and the problem of knowledge p.23
  51. Jump up ^ Husserl, Edmund (1931) Cartesian Meditations: An Introduction to Phenomenology quotation:

    When, with the beginning of modern times, religious belief was becoming more and more externalized as a lifeless convention, men of intellect were lifted by a new belief: their great belief in an autonomous philosophy and science. [...] in philosophy, the Meditations were epoch-making in a quite unique sense, and precisely because of their going back to the pure ego cogito. Descartes, in fact, inaugurates an entirely new kind of philosophy. Changing its total style, philosophy takes a radical turn: from naïve objectivism to transcendental subjectivism.

  52. Jump up ^ René Descartes, Discourse de la Méthode … (Leiden, (Netherlands): Jan Maire, 1637), appended book: La Géométrie, book one, page 299. From page 299: " … Et aa, ou a2, pour multiplier a par soy mesme; Et a3, pour le multiplier encore une fois par a, & ainsi a l'infini ; … " ( … and aa, or a2, in order to multiply a by itself; and a3, in order to multiply it once more by a, and thus to infinity ; … )
  53. Jump up ^ Tom Sorell, Descartes: A Very Short Introduction, (2000). New York: Oxford University Press. p. 19.
  54. Jump up ^ Morris Kline, Mathematical Thought from Ancient to Modern Times, (1972). New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 280–281
  55. Jump up ^ Gullberg, Jan (1997). Mathematics From The Birth of Numbers. W. W. Norton. ISBN 0-393-04002-X. 
  56. Jump up ^ Tipler, P. A. and G. Mosca (2004). Physics For Scientists And Engineers. W. H. Freeman. ISBN 0-7167-4389-2. 
  57. Jump up ^ "René Descartes". Encarta. Microsoft. 2008. Retrieved 15 August 2007. 
  58. Jump up ^ Cottingham, John, Dugald Murdoch, and Robert Stoothof. The Philosophical Writings of Descartes.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985. 293.
  59. Jump up ^ Vlasblom, Dirk (25 February 2010). "Unknown letter from Descartes found". Nrc.nl. Retrieved 30 May 2012. 
  60. Jump up ^ (Dutch)" Hoe Descartes in 1641 op andere gedachten kwam – Onbekende brief van Franse filosoof gevonden"

References[edit]

Collected works[edit]

  • Oeuvres de Descartes edited by Charles Adam and Paul Tannery, Paris: Léopold Cerf, 1897–1913, 13 volumes; new revised edition, Paris: Vrin-CNRS, 1964–1974, 11 volumes (the first 5 volumes contains the correspondence).

This edition is traditionally cited with the initials AT (for Adam and Tannery) followed by a volume number in Roman numerals; thus AT VII refers to Oeuvres de Descartes volume 7.

  • Etude du bon sens, La recherche de la vérité et autres écrits de jeunesse (1616–1631) edited by Vincent Carraud and Gilles Olivo, Paris: PUF, 2013.
  • Descartes, Œuvres complètes, new édition edited by Jean-Marie Beyssade and Denis Kambouchner, Paris: Gallimard, published volumes:
    • III: Discours de la Méthode et Essais, 2009.
    • VIII: Correspondance, 1 edited by Jean-Robert Armogathe, 2013.
    • VIII: Correspondance, 2 edited by Jean-Robert Armogathe, 2013.

Collected English translations[edit]

  • 1955. The Philosophical Works, E.S. Haldane and G.R.T. Ross, trans. Dover Publications. This work is traditionally cited with the initials HR (for Haldane and Ross) followed by a volume number in Roman numerals; thus HRII refers to volume 2 of this edition.
  • 1988. The Philosophical Writings of Descartes in 3 vols. Cottingham, J., Stoothoff, R., Kenny, A., and Murdoch, D., trans. Cambridge University Press.
  • 1998. René Descartes: The World and Other Writings. Translated and edited by Stephen Gaukroger. Cambridge University Press. (This consists mainly of scientific writings, on physics, biology, astronomy, optics, etc., which were very influential in the 17th and 18th centuries, but which are routinely omitted or much abridged in modern collections of Descartes’philosophical works.)

Translation of single works[edit]

  • 1628. Regulae ad directionem ingenii. Rules for the Direction of the Natural Intelligence. A Bilingual Edition of the Cartesian Treatise on Method, ed. and tr. by G. Heffernan, Amsterdam-Atlanta: Rodopi, 1998.
  • 1633. The World, or Treatise on Light, tr. by Michael S. Mahoney. http://www.princeton.edu/~hos/mike/texts/descartes/world/worldfr.htm
  • 1633. Treatise of Man, tr. by T.S. Hall. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1972.
  • 1637. Discourse on the Method, tr. by Donald A. Cress, Third edition, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1998.
  • 1637. The Geometry of René Descartes, tr. by David E. Smith and M. L. Lantham, New York: Dover, 1954.
  • 1641. Meditations on First Philosophy, tr. by J. Cottingham, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Latin original. Alternative English title: Metaphysical Meditations. Includes six Objections and Replies. A second edition published the following year, includes an additional Objection and Reply and a Letter to Dinet. HTML Online Latin-French-English Edition.
  • 1644. Principles of Philosophy, tr. by V. R. Miller and R. P. Dordrecht: Reidel, 1983.
  • 1648. Descartes' Conversation with Burman, tr. by J. Cottingham, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989.
  • 1649. Passions of the Soul. tr. by S. H. Voss, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1989. Dedicated to Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia.

Secondary literature[edit]

  • Boyer, Carl (1985). A History of Mathematics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-02391-3. 
  • Carriero, John (2008). Between Two Worlds. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-13561-8. 
  • Clarke, Desmond (2006). Descartes: A Biography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-82301-3. 
  • Costabel, Pierre (1987). René Descartes – Exercices pour les éléments des solides. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. ISBN 2-13-040099-X. 
  • Cottingham, John (1992). The Cambridge Companion to Descartes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-36696-8. 
  • Duncan, Steven M. (2008). The Proof of the External World: Cartesian Theism and the Possibility of Knowledge. Cambridge: James Clarke & Co. ISBN 978-02271-7267-4. 
  • Farrell, John. "Demons of Descartes and Hobbes." Paranoia and Modernity: Cervantes to Rousseau (Cornell UP, 2006), chapter 7.
  • Garber, Daniel (1992). Descartes' Metaphysical Physics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-28219-8. 
  • Garber, Daniel; Michael Ayers (1998). The Cambridge History of Seventeenth-Century Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-53721-5. 
  • Gaukroger, Stephen (1995). Descartes: An Intellectual Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-823994-7. 
  • Gillespie, A. (2006). Descartes' demon: A dialogical analysis of 'Meditations on First Philosophy.'[1] Theory & Psychology, 16, 761–781.
  • Grayling, A.C. (2005). Descartes: The Life and times of a Genius. New York: Walker Publishing Co., Inc. ISBN 0-8027-1501-X. 
  • Heidegger, Martin [1938] (2002) The Age of the World Picture in Off the beaten track pp. 57–85
  • Keeling, S. V. (1968). Descartes. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN. 
  • Melchert, Norman (2002). The Great Conversation: A Historical Introduction to Philosophy. New York: McGraw Hill. ISBN 0-19-517510-7. 
  • Moreno Romo, Juan Carlos, Vindicación del cartesianismo radical, Anthropos, Barcelona, 2010.
  • Moreno Romo, Juan Carlos (Coord.), Descartes vivo. Ejercicios de hermenéutica cartesiana, Anthropos, Barcelona, 2007'
  • Naaman-Zauderer, Noa (2010). Descartes' Deontological Turn: Reason, Will and Virtue in the Later Writings. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-76330-1. 
  • Negri, Antonio (2007) The Political Descartes, Verso.
  • Ozaki, Makoto (1991). Kartenspiel, oder Kommentar zu den Meditationen des Herrn Descartes. Berlin: Klein Verlag. ISBN 3-927199-01-X. 
  • Schäfer, Rainer (2006). Zweifel und Sein – Der Ursprung des modernen Selbstbewusstseins in Descartes' cogito. Wuerzburg: Koenigshausen&Neumann. ISBN 3-8260-3202-0. 
  • Ostrom, H., 2012, "Logic's Prophet." Original screenplay. Congruent Angle Press. Amazon Kindle.
  • Serfati, M., 2005, "Géometrie" in Ivor Grattan-Guinness, ed., Landmark Writings in Western Mathematics. Elsevier: 1–22.
  • Sorrell, Tom (1987). Descartes. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-287636-8. 
  • Vrooman, Jack Rochford (1970). René Descartes: A Biography. Putnam Press. 
  • Watson, Richard A. (31 March 2012). "René Descartes". Encyclopædia Britannica (Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc). Retrieved 31 March 2012. 
  • Watson, Richard A. (2007). Cogito, Ergo Sum: a life of René Descartes. David R Godine. 2002, reprint 2007. ISBN 978-1-56792-335-3. Was chosen by the New York Public library as one of "25 Books to Remember from 2002"
  • Woo, B. Hoon (2013). "The Understanding of Gisbertus Voetius and René Descartes on the Relationship of Faith and Reason, and Theology and Philosophy". Westminster Theological Journal 75 (1): 45–63. 

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