Commentary
[in chronological order]
Matter Matters: Metaphysics and Methodology in the Early Modern Period
- Kurt Smith. Matter Matters: Metaphysics and Methodology in the Early Modern Period. Oxford University Press. 2010. 304pp.From the publisher: Why is there a material world? Why is it fundamentally mathematical? Matter Matters explores a seventeenth-century answer to these questions as it emerged from the works of Descartes and Leibniz. The “mathematization” of the… More
Descartes and the Puzzle of Sensory Representation
- Raffaella De Rosa. Descartes and the Puzzle of Sensory Representation. Oxford University Press. 2010. 208pp.From the publisher: While much has been written on Descartes’ theory of mind and ideas, no systematic study of his theory of sensory representation and misrepresentation is currently available in the literature. Descartes and the Puzzle of Sensory… More
Descartes’s Changing Mind
- Peter Machamer; J.E. McGuire. Descartes's Changing Mind, Princeton: Princeton University Press. 2009.From the publisher: Descartes’s works are often treated as a unified, unchanging whole. But in Descartes’s Changing Mind, Peter Machamer and J. E. McGuire argue that the philosopher’s views, particularly in natural philosophy, actually… More
A Companion to Descartes
- Janet Broughton; John Carriero (editors), A Companion to Descartes, Oxford: Blackwell, 2007, 560pp.From the publisher: A collection of more than 30 specially commissioned essays, this volume surveys the work of the 17th-century philosopher-scientist commonly regarded as the founder of modern philosophy, while integrating unique essays detailing the context… More
A Companion to Rationalism
- Alan Nelson (editor). A Companion to Rationalism, Oxford: Blackwell. 2006.From the publisher: This book is a wide-ranging examination of rationalist thought in philosophy from ancient times to the present day. Written by a superbly qualified cast of philosophers Critically analyses the concept of rationalism Focuses principally on… More
The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution: Descartes, Pascal, Leibniz, and the Cultivation of Virtue
- Matthew L. Jones. The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution: Descartes, Pascal, Leibniz, and the Cultivation of Virtue. University of Chicago Press. 2006. 384pp.From the publisher: Amid the unrest, dislocation, and uncertainty of seventeenth-century Europe, readers seeking consolation and assurance turned to philosophical and scientific books that offered ways of conquering fears and training the mind—guidance for… More
The Blackwell Guide to Descartes’ Meditations
- Stephen Gaukroger (editor). The Blackwell Guide to Descartes' Meditations. Blackwell. 2006. 288pp.From the publisher: Consisting of twelve newly commissioned essays and enhanced by William Molyneux’s famous early translation of the Meditations, this volume touches on all the major themes of one of the most influential texts in the history of philosophy.… More
Descartes and the Passionate Mind
- Deborah, Brown, Descartes and the Passionate Mind, Cambridge University Press, 2006, 244pp.From the publisher: Descartes is often accused of having fragmented the human being into two independent substances, mind and body, with no clear strategy for explaining the apparent unity of human experience. Deborah Brown argues that, contrary to this view,… More
Descartes Reinvented
- Tom Sorell. Descartes Reinvented. Cambridge University Press. 2005. 180pp.From the publisher: Thomas Sorell seeks to rehabilitate views that are highly unpopular in analytic philosophy and often instantly dismissed. His book serves as an interpretation, if not outright revision, of unreconstructed Cartesianism and responds directly… More
Descartes and Cartesianism
- Nathan D. Smith; Jason P. Taylor (editors). Descartes and Cartesianism. Cambridge Scholars Press. 2005. 228pp.From the publisher: Descartes is well known for his decisive and spectacular break with the philosophical tradition. Indeed, on account of that break, he is frequently reputed to be the father of modern philosophy. This reputation, in an important sense,… More
Major Works
The Discourse on Method
- The Discourse on Method, translated, edited by Pamela Kraus and Frank Hunt, Introduction by Richard Kennington (Focus Library, R. Pullins Co., 2007).From the publisher: This is an English translation of Descartes’ seminal discourse, with an original essay by Richard Kennington. This text is designed to provide the student with a close translation, notes, and a glossary of key terms, facilitating… More
The Passions of the Soul
- The Passions of the Soul, translated by Stephen H. Voss (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1989).From the publisher: Contents include a translator’s introduction, introduction by Genevieve Rodis-Lewis, bibliography, index, index locorum, and The Passions of the Soul — PART I: About the Passions in General, and Incidentally about the Entire… More
The Geometry of René Descartes
- The Geometry of René Descartes, translated by David Eugene Smith and Marcia L. Lantham (New York: Dover Publications, 1954).Excerpt: If a mathematician were asked to name the great epoch-making works in his science, he might well hesitate in his decision concerning the product of the nineteenth century ; he might even hesitate with respect to the eighteenth century ; but as to the… More
Principles of Philosophy
- Principles of Philosophy, translated by V.R. Miller and R.P. Miller (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1983).From the publisher: Principles of Philosophy was written in Latin by René Descartes. Published in 1644, it was intended to replace Aristotle’s philosophy and traditional Scholastic Philosophy. This volume contains a letter of the author to the French… More
Meditations on First Philosophy
- Meditations on First Philosophy, translated by John Cottingham, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.From the publisher: The Meditations, one of the key texts of Western philosophy, is the most widely studied of all Descartes’ writings. This authoritative translation by John Cottingham, taken from the much acclaimed three-volume Cambridge edition of… More