The cartesian view on biology was a necessity to avoid public burning, and essential to make positive science possible. Before Descartes, it wasn't at all clea

The cartesian view on biology was a necessity to avoid public burning, and essential to make positive science possible. Before Descartes, it wasn't at all clear and obvious that mere things had no intention, no wants, no "soul". In fact, Aristotelian physics considered that a stone drops because of its "grave" nature, that it somehow wishes to go down (The last gasp of this magical thinking lasted well into the 19th century, until Pasteur finally demonstrated that there is no spontaneous generation). By excluding everything non-human from any "soul", Descartes made science as we know it possible. It was a paradigm shift of immense conceptual importance.