Slashdot Mirror
Key Letter By Descartes Found After 170 Years
Schiphol writes of a long-lost letter by René Descartes to Marin Mersenne that has come to light at Haverford College, in Pennsylvania, where it had lain buried in the archives for more than a century. The discovery could revolutionize our view of one of the 17th-century French philosopher's major works. "[T]housands of treasured documents... vanished from the Institut de France in the mid-1800s, stolen by an Italian mathematician. Among them were 72 letters by René Descartes... Now one of those purloined letters has turned up at a small private college in eastern Pennsylvania... The letter, dated May 27, 1641, concerns the publication of Meditations on First Philosophy, a celebrated work whose use of reason and scientific methods helped to ignite a revolution in thought."
Yeah, we don't have that "é " letter in our alphabet, so we must have lost it. However I'm thinking René Descartes may have just stolen it... you know how those French are...
Karma: Excellent. 15 moderator points expire sometime.
Rene Descartes walks into a bar. The bartender asks "can I get you a beer?" Descartes replies "I think not!" and he disappears.
Thanks, I'm here all week!
can we have the text please? (Preferably in a human language)
Sorry, it's written in French.
There was this magnificent mathematical horse. You could teach it arithmetic, which it learned with no difficulty, algebra was a breeze, it could even prove theorems in euclidean geometry, but when you tried to teach it analytic geometry, it would rear back on its hind legs, kick ferociously neigh loudly and make violent head motions in resistance.
The moral of this story is that you can't put Descartes before de horse.
*ducks*
http://www.object404.com
It's turtles all the way down, young man.
Free Martian Whores!
Well, the letter itself is incapable of thought, so logic fails when trying to determine whether or not the letter exists.
He just waited until their backs were turned.
Sure, here you go.
Hey man. You know that whole Meditations thing? Sorry about that. I was totally high when I wrote it. "I think, therefore I am," sounds really deep when you've got orange frogs singing Pink Floyd to you. If you get a chance can you help me retract this thing? I don't want to look like an idiot.
P.S. Do you know what a Pink Floyd is?
cheers bruce!
comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
I think it's the variant on the old joke.
"For 30 years, the guard at the French Public Library for the evening shift noticed Gugli walking out with a book tucked under his arm. He always make sure to talk to Gugli, as Gugli would look very suspicious, as if he'd done something wrong. The guard always figured there wasn't something quite right about Gugli. So he'd search him, but always find nothing.
"After retiring, the guard wanted this mystery solved, so one day he followed Gugli home. He asked, 'Okay, I know you've been making some kind of mischief all these years, but I've never been able to figure out what. What have you been stealing?'
"Gugli responded, 'Books!'"
Information theory is life. The rest is just the KL divergence.
I still can't get laid at the local bars, maybe I should stop talking about Math.
Perhaps astrology might work better. Do you have any good charts?
Thanx,
Rene
O rly? My body contains water molecule from the cum of Jesus. Top that.
Meh, it's getting a bit stale. Besides, it wasn't really that funny when Decartes thought he told it in 1630.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I do enjoy a good ghoti for lunch.
Marvin? Is that you?
Free Martian Whores!