René Descartes, a French philosopher and mathematician who lived from 1596 to 1650, is well known for outlining a mechanical philosophy intended to replace the traditional Aristotelian system. His mechanical philosophy centered on the idea of matter in motion; he believed the contact and impulsion of matter could explain all natural phenomena. He used the idea of matter in motion to explain everything picked up by the senses and even took a mechanical approach in explaining the workings of the human body. While these ideas behind the mechanical philosophy are often associated with Descartes, it is important to realize that Descartes was not the first to champion such a philosophy.
[...] Additionally, he believed that matter could be infinitely divided and that its only quality was geometric extension.[3] Descartes identified more with Gassendi's Christianized philosophy than the atheist ideas of Epicurus, yet he believed that God played a more passive role; God set matter in motion when he created it, and the total amount of motion had since been conserved. Finally and most significantly, Descartes attempted to create a mathematical system that was rooted in complete certainty, while Gassendi's system was more empirical and hypothetical.[4] Descartes accepted the basic idea of Epicurus and Gassendi, the idea that matter in motion could explain all natural phenomena, but interpreted the idea in his own mathematical way with his own rules and principles. [...]
[...] While Gassendi shared many of Epicurus's beliefs, he added that a divine being created atoms and endowed them with an internal principle of motion.[2] Gassendi believed that the qualities of this matter their size, shape, and mass could explain the qualities of all other objects, including qualities of the occult. He outlined this mechanical system in his posthumously published Syntagma philosophicum (1658). Descartes's mechanical philosophy differed significantly from the atomism of Epicurus and Gassendi. Unlike his predecessors, Descartes did not believe in the existence of the void; he argued that matter filled all of space. [...]
[...] Discourse on Method (1637) outlines his physico-mathematical corpuscularism, which describes matter in terms of the geometrical property of extension and its movement in terms of vortical motion.[7] He even wrote in his Principles that the principles of geometry and pure mathematics “explain all natural phenomena.”[8] Isaac Beeckman set a strong example for Descartes and encouraged him to explain physical phenomena through mathematical means, and in this way Beeckman strongly influenced the development of Descartes's mathematically-based mechanical philosophy.[9] A final figure who significantly influenced Descartes's mechanical philosophy was the physician William Harvey (1587-1657). [...]
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