Descartes was born in La Haye (now called La Haye-Descartes), in a well-to-do family. He was educated at the Jesuit College at La Flèche and obtained a degree in law from the University of Poitiers in 1616. He spent several years as a soldier and served in the Bavarian army in 1619, when he ended his military career.

From 1619 to 1627 Descartes lived in Paris and spent the rest of his life travelling outside France and devoting himself to philosophy and sciences. Although he was Catholic Descartes opposed scolasticism and started to enquire human knowledge on the basis of methodological scepticism. Descartes argued that one can doubt all, but not one's own existence as a thinking being. From this he concluded that God must exist and because God cannot be a deceiver, the significance on sensory data must be evaluated by reason. Descartes also believed that mind and body are distinct substances, which made immortality possible.

In 1649 Descartes went to Sweden, where he was invited by the Queen Christina (1626-89) to teach her philosophy and establish an institute for sciences. Next year he became ill with pneumonia and died in Stockholm on February 11, 1650.

Descartes's conceptions of philosophy and science inflenced deeply European culture and thinking. Even his opponents, Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) and later among others Voltaire (1694-1778) who satirized Descartes' theory of vortices, largely followed him in his emphasis on analysis and in rejection of tradition.

Discours de la méthode (1637) / Discourse on Method - Written in French and not in the more conventional Latin, addressed to the general reader. The autobiographical work is didived into six parts. Descartes portrays himself as a sort of Socrates in search of truth and wisdom. The first two parts depict his early philosophical doubts, and culminate in the discovery of his 'method'. He finds four rules for reforming his own ways of thiking: first, accept nothing that is not clear and distinct; second, divide difficult subjects into many small parts; third, start with the simplest problems; fourth, be comprehensive. - In the third part Descartes explains his sytem of morality, metaphysics in part 4, in part 5 he describes his model of cosmos and the mechanics of human body, especially the workings of the circulation system. Part 6 provides an introduction to the essays on meteorology and optics. - Although Discourse was an economical disapointment for Descartes in sales figures, it attracted a wide and immediate reaction.

NOTE: Descartes' remains have been moved and buried several times. His skull has been in the Musée de l'Homme.

For further reading: The Metaphysics of Descartes by Leslie Beck (1965); Descartes by John Cottingham (1986); Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen by Harry G. Frankfurt (1987); The Cambridge Companion to Descartes, ed. by John Cottingham (1992); Descartes by Georges Dicker (1993); Descartes by Stephen Gaukroger (1995)

Selected works:

• LE MONDE, 1632 - The World
• ESSAIS PHILOSOPHIQUES, 1637
• DISCOURS DE LA MÉTHODE POUR BIEN CONDUIRE SA RAISON, ET CHERCHER LA VÉRITÉ DANS LE SCIENCES, 1937 - Discourse on the Method for Rightly Conducting One's Reason and Searching for Truth in the Sciences
• MEDITATIONES DE PRIMA PHILOSOPHIA, 1641 - Meditations Concerning Primary Philosophy
• PRINCIPIA PHILOSOPHIAE, 1644 - Principles of Philosophy
• LES PASSIONS DE L'ÂME, published in French in 1649 - Treatise on the Passions
• REGULAE AD DIRECTIONEM INGENII, composed in the late 1620s, published 1701- Rules for the Direction of the Mind