Today I Learned

Cartesian Flowchart The influence of René Descartes is hard to describe, and harder to demonstrate, but there are a few clues out there. Even if you discount most of his contributions to mathematics, physics, and philosophy, the phrase ‘Cogito, ergo sum’ (‘I think, therefore I am’) and the fact that we use the term ‘Cartesian geometry’ are a bit of a giveaway. With the ‘cogito’, Descartes was attempting to establish a ‘first principle’, upon which other ideas could be based.