René Descartes is credited with the development of calculus, otherwise known as a way to control nature through the combination of math and science. His revolutionary discoveries have helped cause drastic changes in humanity’s perception of nature. Suddenly nature was not a dangerous and unfathomable mystery, but a savage beast that could be studied and tamed. Descartes essentially created a harness for Mother Nature. Personally, I do not see his discovery as a particularly good thing; in fact, I view him as a parallel to Prometheus, the individual who brought fire to humanity. Both he and Prometheus discovered something that had tremendous benefits for mankind–but both discoveries have also led to many atrocities.
Descartes also seems similar to Prometheus because they both failed to see the potential harm in their discoveries. Descartes was focused mainly on the medical benefits that could be achieved by tampering with nature; he saw it as a road to immortality. However, unlike Prometheus, who simply handed fire to humans, Descartes had to work hard to develop his methods. He tried examining the sciences of his own time, as well as the sciences of the past, and although he was not viciously critical of them, he made it very clear in his Discourse on Method that he found the traditional sciences to be lacking. Descartes saw the flaws in the established systems of scientific thinking, mainly that there were too many uncertainties and too many prejudiced individuals. In his studies, Descartes was privy to many unique opinions of many different individuals, opinions that tainted scientific studies instead of strengthening them. Upon examining all the traits of customary science that he classified as imperfections, Descartes brushed aside the conventional ideas and began from the ground up. He may not have hated the traditional conceptions of the world, but he found enough fault with them to manufacture his own perceptions, perceptions that would help him change the world just as Prometheus supposedly did.
Sharon Shares 