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===Cartesian Natural Philosophy===

Descartes scientific theories about the natural world were grounded in a metaphysical foundation, in turn deduced by the application of his rationalist methodology. He wrote that "the whole of philosophy is like a tree. The roots are metaphysics, the trunk is physics, and the branches emerging from the trunk are all the other sciences, which may be reduced to three principle ones, namely medicine, mechanics, and morals".[[CiteRef::Clarke (1992)|p. 271]] One ought to construct a metaphysics first, based on criteria independent of observation, and subsequently consider physical theories consistent with the metaphysical foundation. His natural philosophy was in stark contrast to the accepted Aristotelianism. In Aristotelian natural philosophy all objects were a compound of form and matter, a concept called hylomorphism. Form gives material bodies their distinctive properties, and makes them different from one another. It explains why fire rises and stones fall. Matter is what all material bodies share in common. All things have teleological goals or purposes. [[CiteRef::Shields (2016)]]

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