Rene descartes biography for kids

This is because if he were not real, then how would he have this feeling that he was thinking. He shortened this view, saying in Latin"Cogito ergo sum," meaning "I think, therefore I am. He also thought he could show that God exists, in the same way that he felt that he was thinking. Descartes said that God was the same as infinity and that he could clearly see infinity because he could think of every larger object but no largest object.

Rene descartes biography for kids: René Descartes was a

Descartes said that if God exists then the world must exist as well, since God was good and would not let us think the world is real exists if it was not real. Finally, Descartes thought that because he knew he was thinking, but could only know anything else about himself for example that he had two arms and two legs because he knew that God exists, then he must be made up of two things: the mind that thinks and the body that is independent of thinking, yet they are united together.

This is called "Cartesian Dualism". In MathematicsDescartes is considered of utmost importance for his discovery of analytic geometry. Up to Descartes's times, geometrydealing with lines and shapes, and algebradealing with numbers, were regarded as completely different subsets of mathematics. Descartes showed how almost all problems in geometry could be translated into problems in algebra, by regarding them as questions asking for the length of a line segment, and using a Coordinate system to describe the problem.

Descartes's theory provided the basis for the Calculus of Newton and Leibnizand thus for much of modern mathematics. Accustomed to working in bed till noon, the demands of early morning study by Christina may have had a detrimental effect on his health. Later, his remains were taken to France from Sweden and buried in the Church of St. Genevieve-du-Mont in Paris.

Contents Royalist The noun or adjective, Royalist, can have several shades of meaning. At its simplest, it refers to an adherent of a monarch or Link to Kids. He set out to trust only that which is clearly and distinctly seen to be beyond any doubt. Anything that could be doubted was rejected. This included God and the teachings of the church.

He believed that he could not trust his senses, because distance can distort what you see. He came to the conclusion that he could only trust mathematics because, awake or asleep, two plus three always equals five. After establishing that he existed, he spent the rest of his life trying to prove how minds and bodies work together. Descartes asked Beeckman to translate the problem from Dutch to French.

In their following meetings Beeckman interested Descartes in his corpuscularian approach to mechanical theory, and convinced him to devote his studies to a mathematical approach to nature. InBeeckman also introduced him to many of Galileo 's ideas. Together, they worked on free fallcatenariesconic sectionsand fluid statics.

Rene descartes biography for kids: René Descartes (March 31, –

Both believed that it was necessary to create a method that thoroughly linked mathematics and physics. In Principles of Philosophy Principia Philosophiae from Descartes outlined his views on the universe. In it he describes his three laws of motion. Newton's own laws of motion would later be modeled on Descartes' exposition. Descartes defined "quantity of motion" Latin : quantitas motus as the product of size and speed, and claimed that the total quantity of motion in the universe is conserved.

If x is twice the size of y, and is moving half as fast, then there's the same amount of motion in each. Descartes had discovered an early form of the law of conservation of momentum. He envisioned quantity of motion as pertaining to motion in a straight line, as opposed to perfect circular motion, as Galileo had envisioned it. Descartes' discovery should not be seen as the modern law of conservation of momentum, since had no concept of mass as distinct from weight or size, and since he believed that it is speed rather than velocity that is conserved.

Descartes' vortex theory of planetary motion was later rejected by Newton in favor of his law of universal gravitationand most of the second book of Newton's Principia is devoted to his counterargument.

Rene descartes biography for kids: René Descartes was born on

Descartes also made contributions to the field of optics. He showed by using geometric construction and the law of refraction also known as Descartes' law, or more commonly Snell's law outside France that the angular radius of a rainbow is 42 degrees i. He also independently discovered the law of reflectionand his essay on optics was the first published mention of this law.

Descartes first proposed the idea that the elements were made up of small particles that join together imperfectly, thus leaving small spaces in between. These spaces were then filled with smaller much quicker "subtile matter". These particles were different based on what element they constructed, for example, Descartes believed that particles of water were "like little eels, which, though they join and twist around each other, do not, for all that, ever knot or hook together in such a way that they cannot easily be separated.

The size of the particle also matters, if the particle was smaller, not only was it faster and constantly moving, it was more easily agitated by the larger particles, which were slow but had more force. The different qualities, such as combinations and shapes, gave rise to different secondary qualities of materials, such as temperature.

This first idea is the basis for the rest of Descartes' theory on Meteorology. Descartes theorized that when a cloud rests above another cloud and the air around the top cloud is hot, it condenses the vapor around the top cloud, and causes the particles to fall. When the particles falling from the top cloud collided with the bottom cloud's particles it would create thunder.

He compared his theory on thunder to his theory on avalanches. Descartes believed that the booming sound that avalanches created, was due to snow that was heated, and therefore heavier, falling onto the snow that was below it. Another theory that Descartes had was on the production of lightning. Descartes believed that lightning was caused by exhalations trapped between the two colliding clouds.

He believed that in order to make these exhalations viable to produce lightning, they had to be made "fine and inflammable" by hot and dry weather. Whenever the clouds would collide it would cause them to ignite creating lightning, if the cloud above was heavier than the bottom cloud it would also produce thunder. Descartes also believed that clouds were made up of drops of water and ice, and believed that rain would fall whenever the air could no longer support them.

It would fall as snow if the air wasn't warm enough to melt the raindrops. And hail was when the cloud drops would melt, and then freeze again because cold air would refreeze them. Descartes did not use mathematics or instruments as there weren't any at the time to back up his theories on Meteorology and instead used qualitative reasoning in order to deduce his hypothesis.

Rene descartes biography for kids: René Descartes (or Latinized: Renatus Cartesius;

For other uses, see Descartes disambiguation. StockholmSwedish Empire. Western philosophy Dutch philosophy French philosophy.