René Descartes

1596 - 1650

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René Descartes was a French philosopher whose work, La géométrie, includes his application of algebra to geometry from which we now have Cartesian geometry. His work had a great influence on both mathematicians and philosophers.
Full MacTutor biography [Version for printing]
List of References (184 books/articles)

Some Quotations (18)

A Poster of René Descartes

Mathematicians born in the same country

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Additional Material in MacTutor

  1. Descartes reflects on his schooling
  2. Descartes' Method
  3. Descartes' 'Le Monde, ou Traité de la Lumière'
  4. Descartes' 'La Géométrie'
  5. René Descartes on the History of Mathematics
  6. Aubrey's Brief Lives entry

Honours awarded to René Descartes
(Click below for those honoured in this way)
Lunar featuresCrater Descartes
Biography in Aubrey's Brief Lives
Paris street namesRue Descartes ( 5th Arrondissement)
Popular biographies listNumber 16

Other Web sites
  1. Encyclopaedia Britannica
  2. Astroseti (A Spanish translation of this biography)
  3. The Galileo Project
  4. Bellevue College USA
  5. Rouse Ball
  6. The Catholic Encyclopedia
  7. Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
  8. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
  9. Google books
  10. H K Strick
  11. Mathematical Genealogy Project
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The URL of this page is:
http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Mathematicians/Descartes.html