Rene Descartes was a highly influential French philosopher, mathematician, scientist and writer. Many elements of his philosophy have precedent in late Aristolelianism and earlier philosophers like St. Augustine. Descartes was a major figure in 17th century continental rationalism, later advocated by Baruch Spinoza and opposed by the empiricist school of thought consisting of Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. His most famous statement is: Cogito ergo sum, translation in English I think therefore I am.
Descartes employs a method called metaphysical doubt, sometimes also referred to as methodological skepticism: he rejects any ideas that can be doubted, and then reestablishes them in order to acquire a firm foundation for genuine knowledge. Descartes arrives at only a single principle: thought exists. Thought cannot be separated from me, therefore, I exist. We exist as long as we are thinking. We must deny any sensory data that we receive when we look at this approach to our existence.......
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