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Descartes

[dā-kärt′]René 1596-1650

French mathematician and philosopher who discovered that the position of a point can be determined by coordinates, a discovery that laid the foundation for analytic geometry.
The American Heritage® Science Dictionary Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
descartes, rené in Culture

Descartes, René

[(day-kahrt)]

A seventeenth-century French philosopher. He is known for his statement “I think; therefore I am.” Descartes relied on reason to explain the workings of the universe; his ideas are often called “Cartesianism,” after the Latin form of his name.

The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.