Meditations on First Philosophy de Rene Descartes

Meditations on First Philosophy

Rene Descartes

John Veitch

Rene Descartes (1596-1650) is not only one of the men who belongs in the pantheon of the West's greatest thinkers: he influenced everyone else who belongs there too. Descartes was a French philosopher, mathematician and writer who spent most of his life in the Dutch Republic during its Golden Age, where he earned the title "Father of Modern Philosophy." Indeed, subsequent Western philosophy came from his writing on empiricism and thought, which are still studied today. His work in mathematics helped establish the Cartesian coordinate system-allowing algebraic equations to be expressed as geometric shapes. Descartes was also one of the key figures in the Scientific Revolution, leaving a lasting mark with Discourse on the Method, one of the most important works ever written in the West."

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René Descartes (1596-1650) was a pioneering metaphysician, a masterful mathematician, and a significant scientific thinker. He was primarily a mathematician throughout his life, followed by a natural scientist or "natural philosopher" and a metaphysician. He created the methods in mathematics that allowed for algebraic (or "analytic") geometry. He co-formulated the sine rule of refraction, created a significant empirical account of the rainbow, and proposed a naturalistic explanation for how the earth and planets formed in natural philosophy, among other notable accomplishments. A world of matter with a few basic properties and interacting according to a few universal principles was his new conception of the natural world, which has influenced how we think about it even today. Descartes created the contemporary interpretation of the mind-body problem by proposing that this natural world had an immaterial mind that was directly tied to the brain in humans. He offered proof for the existence of God in metaphysics, demonstrating that the nature of matter is an extension and the essence of the mind is thought. Early on, Descartes asserted that he had a unique method, which he later claimed to have used in metaphysics, natural philosophy, and many applications of mathematics.