Descartes's Secret Notebook: A True Tale of Mathematics, Mysticism, and the Quest to Understand the Universe

Biografii lui Descartes au subliniat – şi nu o singură dată – faptul că filosoful francez a fost un ins foarte discret, retras, care a preferat mereu penumbra. <br /><br />Unii au pus acest comportament ascuns şi mistificator pe seama simplei sale dorinţe de linişte. Alţii i-au aflat, în schimb, vom vedea mai jos, mobiluri mai adînci, mai întortocheate. Ei au imaginat adevărate „teorii ale conspiraţiei” pentru a-i explica discreţia și dorința de a nu fi deranjat la orice oră din zi și din noapte.<br /><br />Se spune, de pildă, că Descartes nu păstra legătura cu lumea decît printr-un corespondent de încredere. Doar acesta ştia precis unde locuieşte şi numai el îl putea vizita (la anumite ore!). Se mai spune că Descartes menţiona adrese false pe scrisori, pentru a-i rătăci pe curioși. Se amintește, desigur, că a notat într-o lucrare timpurie o sintagmă care i-a devenit cu timpul deviză și mod de viață: „Larvatus prodeo”: Înaintez mascat / acoperit. Şi, în fine, că a crezut dintotdeauna în adevărul prestigiosului proverb: „Bene vixit, bene qui latuit”: Acela trăieşte bine / fără pericole şi griji /, care ştie să se ascundă / bine. Într-o lume de exhibiționiști și palavragii plini de sine, n-ar fi rău să-i urmăm îndemnul...<br /><br />Amir D. Aczel vede în Descartes un <b>rosacrucian</b> pasionat de magie şi mistică, în linia gînditorilor Renaşterii. Un magistru în ocultism. Pentru a arăta că filosoful a fost negreşit un rosacrucian, Amir D. Aczel spune povestea încîlcită a unui carnet secret, păstrat după moartea lui Descartes de către un discipol pios - un anume Claude Clerselier -, carnet redactat într-o limbă codificată şi studiat abia în 1676 (la peste un sfert de veac după moartea filosofului!) de către Leibniz, care a transcris cîteva fragmente - în special, formule matematice.<br /><br />Carnetul, fireşte, nu s-a păstrat. Au rămas doar notele sumare ale lui G. W. Leibniz. „L-am cercetat ani de zile, i-a mărturisit Claude Clerselier lui Leibniz, dar nimic din ce conţine, simboluri, desene, formule, nu are sens [pentru mine]”. Se pare că Leibniz a intuit misterul matematic, dar a refuzat la rîndu-i să-l divulge contemporanilor. <br /><br />Din acest motiv, una dintre preţioasele formule a fost descifrată abia în anii '80 de către un savant francez. Minune! S-a vădit astfel că Descartes descoperise, cu muuult înainte de Leonhard Euler, o teoremă topologică. Ceea ce nu e exclus. Această teoremă ar reprezenta, firește, unul dintre „secretele universului”. Ceea ce nu rezultă din istoria carnetului pierdut este, totuşi, legătura dintre filosoful-matematician şi membrii Rosa Cruce.<br /> <br />Prin urmare, Descartes a avut o viaţă dublă. Pe de o parte, a contat în ochii prietenilor (cu care a corespondat intens) drept un filosof care, pentru a ajunge la „cogito”, s-a îndoit de orice, inclusiv de adevărurile eterne, stabilite din capul locului de Dumnezeu (care nici El nu le mai poate modifica). Pe de alta, Descartes a fost un rosacrucian tăinuit. <br /><br />Dincolo de datele imediat verificabile, nimic din aceste construcţii ipotetice nu pare credibil. Nu e deloc obligatoriu ca un om ascuns şi solitar să facă parte dintr-o societate secretă. Care, pe deasupra, dacă e să-i credem pe specialişti, nici nu a existat vreodată decît în scripte și narațiuni. Concluzia acestei pseudo-recenzii este următoarea: nu vă încredeţi prea tare în biografi. Mai ales dacă biograful este un matematician șugubăț și vrea să vă ducă de nas.

Giving Descartes his due as precursor to Einstein via Leibnitz et al. His "secret" notebook(s) affirming the Copernicus/Galileo/Kepler mapping of the universe and fundamental [shapes] building blocks of matter as used in analytic geometry to describe same. But why and HOW could Descartes and Spinoza not have crossed paths having both lived in Holland at similar times sharing similar philosophical interests?

Rene Descartes is one of my favorite mathematicians. I love how he made the Cartesian coordinates that makes everything simplified like a number line in every format. He is also more than that. He is a famous personality in Psychology and Philosophy. <br />The Secret Notebook is a very good read that lets you think thoroughly about the world of Mathematics, and the Earth in general. It also talks about principles and other psychology-related critical thinking. <br />

The book was a trifle disappointing. The authors' Fermat's Last Theorem was much better. In this book on Descartes, the author digresses a lot (imho). The saving grace(s) is/are the first and the last chapter.

A look at Descartes’ life and work, written in a very breezy, popular style that supposes almost no math or philosophy experience. This material is peppered by a lot of winking references to Rosicrucians, the Inquisition, and some melodramatic insinuations about Descartes hiding his greatest discoveries (the “secret notebook” of the title, which Leibnitz decoded right after his death, so it’s not exactly secret, is it?).<br /><br />This is the third Aczel book I have read (after the okay <a href="https://goodreads.com/book/show/287802.The_Riddle_of_the_Compass_The_Invention_that_Changed_the_World" title="The Riddle of the Compass The Invention that Changed the World by Amir D. Aczel" rel="noopener">The Riddle of the Compass</a> and the more interesting <a href="https://goodreads.com/book/show/441215.Chance_A_Guide_to_Gambling__Love__the_Stock_Market__and_Just_About_Everything_Else" title="Chance A Guide to Gambling, Love, the Stock Market, and Just About Everything Else by Amir D. Aczel" rel="noopener">Chance</a>), and while the others were both flawed, especially in matters of historical record, those flaws were outweighed by the stories Aczel had to tell. In the case of this book, though, the engine that drives the book, its raison d’etre, is not to tell Descartes’ story but to embellish it into something Dan Brown might write, a potboiler of secret societies and death threats. It is a sham of false drama, which the story of one of history’s greatest intellects, who was deeply religious, created Western philosophy, served as a gentleman soldier, and mingled with royalty, simply does not need. The book is riddled with errors, mostly minor (Aczel describes the Rosicrucians’ symbol right above an illustration of it that is quite unlike his description), and also contains many errors of logic (Aczel says Descartes had nothing to fear from the Inquisition regarding his cosmological model, since it was “not valid,” as if that has anything to do with a challenge to the Church’s authority); but Azcel’s main sin is his constant obfuscation – what he insinuates by not telling all the facts. For example, one of the main “reveals” of the book is that Descartes thought of, and hid, what would become Euler’s formula about three-dimensional solids, when it seems to be commonly accepted by scholars that Descartes did not make the final connection to the finished formula. He makes absurd, silly claims about November 10 being “eerily significant” in Descartes’ life, ironically adding mystical numerology to the life of a logical thinker. The false drama grates after only a few pages (the chapters and chapter breaks all ending with hyperbolic cliffhanger questions, all of which come to nothing in particular). And it is packed with uninformative filler (Descartes stopped to rest his horses! He went to an inn that was popular! This inn had people in it! He rested! He picked up his horses!). The book is deeply disappointing, because a sensible biography of Descartes for the layman, with Azcel using his expertise to make the math clear, could have been a treasure.

English review below the Greek one...<br /><br />ΤΟ ΚΡΥΦΟ ΣΗΜΕΙΩΜΑΤΑΡΙΟ ΤΟΥ ΝΤΕΚΑΡΤ<br />Εκδόσεις ΕΝΑΛΙΟΣ<br />ISBN: 9789605366032<br /><br />Μου αρέσει που αυτός ο εκδοτικός οίκος επιλέγει βιβλία από καθηγητές και άλλους που καταπιάνονται με διάφορα θέματα και τα κάνουν προσιτά στο ευρύ κοινό. Κάποιες φορές όμως οι συγγραφείς και οι εκδότες τους προσπαθόντας να κάνουν ένα βιβλίο πιο ελκυστικό, το περιγράφουν με έναν τρόπο που χωρίς να είναι ψευδής, σε προδιαθέτει για κάτι διαφορετικό.<br /><br />Το ίδιο συμβαίνει και με αυτό το βιβλίο. Στο μεγαλύτερο μέρος του, ο Aczel απλώς εξιστορεί τη ζωή του René Descartes. Βασίζεται στην επίσκεψή του στο μέρος που μεγάλωσε και το εκεί μουσείο που είναι αφιερωμένο σε αυτόν ως πηγή για την παιδική του ηλικία και κυρίως στην βιογραφία του Descartes από τον λόγιο και ιερέα Adrien Baillet που εκδόθηκε περίπου 40 χρόνια μετά το θάνατο του Descartes. Στην αρχή του βιβλίου ο Aczel αναφέρεται σε ένα κρυφό σημειωματάριο και στο ενδιαφέρον του Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz να το διαβάσει και να το αποκωδικοποιήσει, αφήνωντας να εννοηθεί κάποιο μυστήριο στη συνέχεια της ιστορίας. Υπάρχουν κάποιες λίγες αναφορές και υποθέσεις για την αδελφότητα των Ροδόσταυρων και για το αν ο Descartes ήταν ή δεν ήταν μέλος της, συχνά βασιζόμενες σε πολύ έμμεσες ενδείξεις. Προς το πολύ τέλος του βιβλίου ο συγγραφέας επανέρχεται στο κρυφό σημειωματάριο και αποκαλύπτει τι περιείχε και γιατί και πως (ίσως) κρατήθηκε κρυφό. Υπάρχουν αναφορές στη φιλοσοφία και στο έργο του Descartes στα μαθηματικά, καθώς και αναφορές στο έργο και στη ζωή άλλων προσώπων που σχετίζονται άμεσα ή έμμεσα με το έργο και τη ζωή του.<br /><br />Γενικά αισθάνθηκα ότι το βιβλίο στερείται προσανατολισμού και ότι ο συγγραφέας συχνά χάνεται στις σκέψεις του. Υπάρχουν πολλές υποθέσεις και παραφιλολογία καθώς και φανταστικές σκηνές εδώ κι εκεί ανάμεσα στην εξιστόρηση πραγματικών γεγονότων. Πάντα μου αρέσει η Ιστορία καθώς και να μαθαίνω για πρόσωπα και πράγματα και για διάφορους επιστημονικούς τομείς ακόμα κι αν δεν είναι το φόρτε μου (Μαθηματικά π.χ.), όμως θέλω ταυτόχρονα ένα βιβλίο να έχει μία ταυτότητα, ροή και ειρμό. Εδώ το βιβλίο πάσχει.<br /><br />ΥΓ: Αρκετά τυπογραφικά, ορθογραφικά κτλ σε αυτή την έκδοση. Δεν είναι ότι δεν διαβάζεται, αλλά πάντα με εκνευρίζει αυτό στα βιβλία και δεν είναι η πρώτη φορά που συμβαίνει με τις Εκδόσεις Ενάλιος. Επιμελητή δεν έχετε;<br /><br /><br />I feel that the blurb of this book is kind of misleading and that while I enjoy reading and learning everything that has to do with History, people, events, various themes and subjects (even if they are not my strong point, eg maths), I still need a book to have an identity, decent pace and to make sense. This book lacks a direction and I felt that the author often got sidetracked and lost his plot and/or made lots of assumptions and took a wide berth from his original subject matter.

A graceful mixture. The titular notebook, item M, is the focal point towards which the many strands in this book get weaved. This book covers Descartes' journey from birth to death, the many significant people, and historical events that interacted with Descartes. I got a lovely sense of the social and cultural issues and crises of his day, as well as a wealth of esoteric references that help reveal the world of thought and idea that Descartes and the intellectuals of his day were engaged with. Descartes' work and its relevance to the historical development of modern science, and philosophy is outlined and sampled enough for the layperson to understand and follow the story without going into the details of their content. I recommend this in particular for people interested in the person of Rene Descartes, or interested in the life of a unique and great thinker, or interested in a story that follows one the most famous and important persons of a mostly forgotten place and time that influenced the creation of the modern world. Illuminating.

Εξαιρετικό. Ο Amir Aczel με σημείο αναφοράς τον Καρτέσιο σκιαγραφεί μια σκοτεινή εποχή πολέμων, θρησκευτικού φανατισμού, αντιζηλίας μεταξύ επιστημόνων. Στο επίκεντρο ο τεράστιος φιλόσοφος και επιστήμονας Καρτέσιος μοναχικός, σε μια συνεχή κίνηση για να αποφύγει την πιθανότητα να διωχθεί, σε μια αέναη μάχη για το τι πρέπει να δημοσιεύσει και τι να κρύψει. Ο Καρτέσιος στην εποχή των θρησκευτικών πολέμων στην Ευρώπη περιπλανιέται και γράφει. Παρίσταται σε κοσμοϊστορικά γεγονότα και συνομιλεί με σημαντικούς ανθρώπους. Κρύβει μεγάλο μέρος της συγγραφικής παραγωγής από τον φόβο της καταδίκης όπως στην περίπτωση τους Γαλιλαίου.<br />Από το εξαιρετικό αυτό βιβλίο παρελαύνουν μεγάλοι επιστήμονες που επηρέασαν η επηρεάστηκαν από τον Καρτέσιο όπως ο Κέπλερ, ο Γαλιλαίος, ο Λάιμπνιτς, ο Νεύτων. Παρελαύνουν και ξεχωριστές γυναίκες όπως η πριγκίπισσα Ελισάβετ της Βοημίας και η Χριστίνα της Σουηδίας. Γύρω από όλους αυτούς το έργο και ο χαρακτήρας μυστικοπαθείας του Καρτέσιου κυριαρχούν, του ανθρώπου που όρισε την σύγχρονη επιστημονική σκέψη.

Descartes’ Secret Notebook<br />By Amir D. Aczel<br /><br />Reviewed by Tom Carrico<br /><br />This fascinating and highly readable book is part biography, part mystery and part treatise on philosophy and mathematics. Rene Descartes lived from 1596 to 1650. His life was one of adventure and discovery. His philosophy was hotly debated at the time and his discoveries in mathematics were and are regarded as genius. This author tries to add another layer to the legend by examining a purported “secret notebook”, long lost but copied in part by German mathematician Gottfied Wilhelm Leibniz after Descartes’ death.<br /><br />Rene Descartes was born to a wealthy family in the town of Chatellerault, France. He was baptized in the Roman Catholic Church and remained a devout and loyal Catholic his entire life. His mother died in childbirth a year later and Descartes’ own health as a youth is described as poor. He received what we all recognize as the great advantage of a Jesuit education (Hoya Saxa! – but we digress) at what is now a military academy in the town of La Fleche, the Prytanee National Militaire. He then received a doctor of laws degree in 1616 and moved to Paris. In Paris he developed his interests in mathematics, physics and eventually, philosophy. He also traveled extensively to the Netherlands and Denmark. His health as an adult was much improved and he never lost his interest in the military. He even joined the army of Maximilian, the duke of Bavaria, at the beginning of the Thirty Years War. It was during this time as a volunteer soldier in Maximilian’s army that he began his studies and interpretations of geometry and science. Eventually Descartes settled in Holland where his Cartesian philosophy created controversy. Everyone is familiar with the “I think, therefore I am” (or “Cogito, ergo sum.”), but the basis for this definitive statement is a very concise, even mathematical, proof of the existence of God. This was the time of turmoil between the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant denominations and the acceptance of Descartes’ reasoning was not universal. He was even accused of the serious charge of atheism despite his devout Catholic heritage and practice. Eventually Descartes became the philosophy instructor for Queen Christina of Denmark. There were jealousies between Descartes and the Queen’s other instructors, as Descartes quickly became the young Queen’s favorite. The fact that the others were strict Calvinists played a role. Descartes died under somewhat suspicious circumstances in Sweden in 1650. There are suggestions that he may have been poisoned by a rival. His belongings were catalogued and shipped to relatives in France. Eventually many of his original documents, including the “secret notebook” alluded to in the book’s title, disappeared.<br /><br />The secret notebook was a private notebook which Descartes never intended to publish. He used codes and symbols that were indecipherable for centuries. Part of this notebook was copied by Leibniz shortly after Descartes death and that is all that remains of the document. Some historians felt that this notebook represented Descartes membership in a secret society, the Rosicrucians. Others felt that Descartes had discovered the origins of the universe. It was not until 1987 when Pierre Costabel published his definitive analysis of Leibniz’ copy of Descartes’ secret notebook that the true meaning of the secret notebook was revealed. Descartes had discovered a coveted formula for a rule which governs the structure of three dimensional solid objects. This was mystery which had eluded Plato and the other Greek geometricians as well as all other mathematicians in history. He had discovered the modern field of topology centuries before its time. The reason he repressed this discovery was because it supported Kepler and Copernicus and their analysis of planetary motion around the sun. The timing of this coincided with the Roman Catholic Church’s prosecution of Galileo for heresy. Descartes, the loyal Catholic, did not want to suffer the same fate.<br /><br />There are many interesting side stories in this tale, including the simultaneous discovery of the calculus by Newton in England and Leibniz in Germany. There may be a connection between these two men which would be, of course, Rene Descartes. Descartes private life is examined as far as historical facts allow, including a possible marriage to a servant girl and a relationship of some sort with Princess Elizabeth of Bavaria who was living in exile in Holland at the same time as Descartes. The exact relationship between Descartes and Queen Christina is a mystery as well. At about age 40, Descartes noticed his first grey hairs. He felt this was a sign of impending death and began dissecting animals by the hundreds in an attempt to discover the secret to a prolonged life. He greatly altered his diet, becoming basically a vegetarian.<br /><br />This is a fascinating book. I remembered very little of Descartes from my Philosophy 101 class and this book made me wish I had paid more attention. The historical aspects of this time are equally absorbing. The author makes the mathematics understandable (not an easy task in my humble opinion) and the philosophy enjoyable. Descartes’ Secret Notebook by Amir D. Aczel is available in trade paperback from Broadway Books.<br /><br /><br />Next Month: This year marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Edgar Allan Poe. We will start looking at the 2009 Edgar Award nominees for best mystery novel of the year, but I will start with a review of Peter Ackroyd’s new biography of Poe.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />

I took this book from Reston's Used Book Store, VA. Interesting, the owner of the store did not have old scientific/philosophical or engineering books. <br /><br />I found fascinating stories and letter of Descartes. <br /><br />One Story: Malebranche first read Descartes philosophy in a manuscript. He did become so excited that he suffered from palpitations of the heart. This is funny; I laughed so loud. <br /><br />Leibniz read Descartes manuscripts, and so did Newton. Overall, I'd recommend this book to fans of Philosophy<br /><br />--Deus Vult <br />Gottfried