French mathematician and philosopher René Descartes died #OTD in 1650.
He is considered one of the founders of modern philosophy. He was the founder of the system of sciences on the knowing subject facing the world he represents to himself. In physics, he made a contribution to optics and is considered one of the founders of mechanism. In mathematics, he was at the origin of analytic geometry. via @wikipedia
@gutenberg_org Apologies in advance...And Rene Descartes was a drunken fart, "I drink therefore I am." Having just re-watched Python live at the Hollywood Bowl, I was given to this.
@MMRnmd No. According to Charles Babbage it was Blaise Pascal, please see below:
"But the earliest piece of mechanism to which the name of a 'calculating machine' can fairly be given, appears to have been a machine invented by the celebrated Pascal. This philosopher and mathematician, who held an official situation in Upper Normandy, the duties of which required frequent numerical calculations, contrived a piece of mechanism to facilitate the performance of them."
"Et remarquant que cette vérité : je pense, donc je suis, était si ferme et si assurée que toutes les plus extravagantes suppositions des sceptiques n'étaient pas capables de l'ébranler, je jugeai que je pouvais la recevoir, sans scrupule, pour le premier principe de la philosophie, que je cherchais."
Discours de la méthode (1637)
~René Descartes (31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650)
And noticing that this truth: I think, therefore I am, was so firm and so assured that all the most extravagant suppositions of the skeptics were not capable of shaking it, I judged that I could accept it, without scruple, for the first principle of philosophy, which I was looking for
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