When publishing his first book anonymously at Leyden in 1637, Descartes showed his deep interest in medicine. Part five of the Discourse on Method offers a detailed account of the movement of the heart and discusses Harvey’s discovery of the circulation of blood. We should note that in the margins of the Discourse on Method, William Harvey’s name is mentioned in Latin and so too is the title De motu cordis. Furthermore, in the text, Descartes speaks of “an English physician, (...) who must be praised for having broken the ice” on the circulation of the blood. Harvey is indeed the only author who is mentioned by name in the Discourse, and his name is mentioned with the respect due to a genuine discoverer. These pages in the fifth part of the Discourse offer a totally new way of dealing with medical questions in the first part of the seventeenth century. I will consider here the Descartes-Harvey debate on the cause of the movement of the heart and Descartes’ approbation of Harvey’s discovery of the circulation of the blood. Yet, the medical context of the seventeenth century must be taken into account if we are properly to understand Descartes’ attitude towards Harvey, as well as the medical goals that Descartes had in mind when he attempted to explain the movement of the heart. (shrink)

"Cet ouvrage est le fruit d'un seminaire de philosophie des sciences organise au Centre Sevres a Paris pendant l'annee universitaire 1987-1988"--Avant-propos.

L' anthropologie cartésienne est un recueil d'articles publiés par Geneviéve Rodis-Lewis de 1955 a 1990 et remaniés. Les théses principales concernent les développements que le theme de l'homme a suscités, de Descartes a Malebranche. Deux aspects constitutifs de l' anthropologie cartesienne sont privilégiés : les sensations et le langage, d'où l'accent mis sur l'union de l'âme au corps et sur l'unite de l'homme, plus que sur le dualisme. L'ouvrage aborde aussi la question médicale des origines de la transfusion, grâce à (...) un écrit de Desgabets. Le chapitre sur les limites du modèle mécanique se trouve prolongé par l'étude des modèles mécaniques dans leur contexte médical. La comparaison entre le corps humain et une machine est un élément essentiel de la méthode cartésienne appliquée à la médecine, parce qu'elle est liée à la réflexion novatrice sur « le principe de vie ». L' anthropologie cartésienne is a collection of articles published by Geneviève Rodis-Lewis from 1955 to 1990 and revised. The main theses concern the developments kindled by the theme of Man from Descartes to Malebranche. Two constituent aspects of Cartesian anthropology are highlighted : sensations and language. That is why emphasis is given to the union of the soul with the body and to the unity of Man, more than to dualism. The work also deals with the medical issue of the origins of transfusion, thanks to a book by Desgabets. The chapter dealing with the limits of the mechanical model is protracted by the study of mechanical models in their medical context. The comparison between the human body and a machine is a crucial element of Cartesian method applied to medicine because it is linked to the innovative reflection on the « principle of life ». (shrink)