Descartes confronts the problem of scepticism in this work, which has been examined by numerous philosophers previously. Descartes adapted his predecessors' and contemporaries' approaches to account for a reality he found unassailable; he began his path of reasoning by doubting everything, so that he could analyse the universe from a fresh perspective, free of any preconceived beliefs.



The book was first published in the Dutch city of Leiden. It was afterwards translated into Latin and published in Amsterdam in 1656. The book was meant to serve as a primer for three works: Dioptrique, Météores, and Géométrie. Descartes' early notions, which later evolved into the Cartesian coordinate system, are contained in La Géométrie. The text was produced and published in French rather than Latin, which was the language used to write and publish most philosophical and scientific texts at the time. The majority of Descartes' previous writings were in Latin. It is the foundation of the Cartesianism epistemology, which includes Meditations on First Philosophy, Principles of Philosophy, and Rules for the Direction of the Mind.