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Descartes

René Descartes (1596 - 1650)

René Descartes (1596 - 1650), philosopher and mathematician, born in La Haye in France. At the age of eight, he started studying logic, physics, metaphysics, and mathematics and other subjects at a Jesuit school. He took part in the Thirty Years' War in Europe. In a dream one winter night in 1619 he is said to have had a vision about a method for attaining an absolutely certain and complete knowledge of nature. The theory was to be constructed on the same foundations as Euclid's Elements, with definitions, axioms, theorems, and proofs. The first proposition was: "Je pense, donc je suis" (I think, therefore I am). With this as a point of departure, a series of new truths could be put forward. The method was published in Discours de la Méthode 1637. The book also contains sections on optics, meteors, and mathematics. In 1649 Descartes was summoned to Sweden by Queen Christina as her private tutor in philosophy.  The following year he died of pneumonia in Stockholm.

Discours de la Méthode 1637