René Descartes
1596–1650 2 entries
Biography
René Descartes was a French philosopher, mathematician and scientist, often called the father of modern philosophy. Educated by the Jesuits at La Flèche, he studied law, served for a time as a volunteer soldier, and spent most of his adult life in the Dutch Republic. In his Discourse on the Method of 1637 he set out to doubt everything that could be doubted, and found one certainty that survived: I think, therefore I am. From there he tried to rebuild knowledge on clear and distinct ideas, in works such as the Meditations on First Philosophy and the Principles of Philosophy.
In mathematics he joined algebra to geometry, and the coordinate system named after him is still taught in every school. He also wrote on optics, on the motion of the heavens and on the passions of the soul. In 1649 he went to Stockholm at the invitation of Queen Christina of Sweden, and he died there of pneumonia the following winter.
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