Page 164 - Encyclopedia Of World History

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Each problem that I solved became a rule which served afterwards
to solve other problems. • René Descartes (1596–1650)

Aristotelian philosophy against itself, in making theo- Descartes, R. (1989). The passions of the soul (S. Voss, Trans.). Indi-
logical space for the ongoing mechanistic investigation of anapolis, IN: Hackett.
Descartes, R. (1998). The world and other writings (S. Gaukroger,
the natural world. Trans.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries Carte- Des Chene, D. (2001). Spirits and clocks: Machine and organism in
Descartes. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
sianism was attacked less for its incoherent dualism than
Gaukroger, S. (1995). Descartes: An intellectual biography. Oxford, UK:
for the specter of atheistic materialism that both conser- Clarendon Press.
vatives and enthusiasts read into it. One story, circulated Hatfield, G. (2002). Routledge philosophy guidebook to Descartes and the
meditations. London: Routledge.
in the eighteenth century to blacken Descartes’ reputa- Reiss,T. (2002). Denying body, making self? Histories and identities. In
tion, concerned his illegitimate daughter Francine: having T. Reiss, Against autonomy: Global dialectics of cultural exchange (pp.
184–218). Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
allegedly conceived the child with a housemaid in order
Rodis-Lewis, G. (1998). Descartes: His life and thought. Ithaca, NY: Cor-
to study reproductive processes at close quarters, after nell University Press.
Francine’s death from scarlet fever (which the historical Sutton, J. (1998). Philosophy and memory traces: Descartes to connec-
tionism. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Descartes called the greatest sorrow of his life), the Watson, R. (2002). Cogito, ergo sum:The life of René Descartes. Boston:
philosopher built and carried around a doll in the form David Godine.
of a life-size automatic replica of the child.
In the 1640s, Descartes continued to work on recalci-
trant problems about physiology and human nature. He
constructed a sophisticated but bizarre embryology, and, Desertification
under persistent questioning from his correspondent
Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia, further developed his esertification is the process of land becoming
views on psychosomatic interaction. In The Passions of Ddesert, as from human mismanagement or climate
the Soul (1649) he linked medicine and morality by change. It remains a controversial issue with regard to
attending to the individualized dynamics of the emo- definition, nature, rate of spread, irreversibility, and cau-
tional life and the union of mind and body. Descartes sation. Nonetheless, it is a serious example of land degra-
had long been fascinated by schemes for prolonging dation in dry lands. Deserts have repeatedly expanded
longevity, but died after a harsh Swedish winter tutoring and contracted during the last few millions of years in
Queen Christina. response to climate changes, but their margins are now
Philosophers of many distinct persuasions have since being affected by a suite of increasing human pressures
defined their projects in opposition to a vision of Carte- that depletes soil and vegetation resources.
sianism as a philosophy of exact order, reason, and pure Desertification was first used as a term, but not for-
subjectivity; but modern scholarship strongly suggests mally defined, by a French forester named “Aubreville” in
that Descartes himself was not that kind of Cartesian. 1949, and for some years the term desertization was also
used, as, for example, by Rapp, who defined it as “the
John Sutton
spread of desert-like conditions in arid or semi-arid areas,
See also Science—Overview; Scientific Revolution due to man’s influence or to climatic change” (Rapp
1974, 3).
Different experts have defined desertification differently
Further Reading with respect to causation. Some definitions stress the
Cottingham, J. (Ed.). (1992). The Cambridge companion to Descartes. importance of anthropogenic (human-caused) actions.
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Dregne says,“Desertification is the impoverishment of ter-
Descartes, R. (1985–1991). The philosophical writings of Descartes (3
vols., J. Cottingham, R. Stoothoff, D. Murdoch, & A. Kenny,Trans.). restrial ecosystems under the impact of man. It is the
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. process of deterioration in these ecosystems that can be