Tinca Prunea-Bretonnet is Researcher at the Research Institute of the University of Bucharest. Her work focuses on Kant and the German Enlightenment, as well as on Emilie du Châtelet and the reception of Kant’s philosophy in the 20th century. Her monograph L’avènement de la métaphysique kantienne. Prémisses et enjeux d’une réception au XXe siècle is forthcoming with Garnier, Paris. Peter R. Anstey is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney. He specialises in early modern philosophy with a particular focus on the thought of John Locke, Robert Boyle, and the French philosophes. His monograph on Experimental Philosophy and the Origins of Empiricism (with Alberto Vanzo) is forthcoming with Cambridge University Press.

• List of figuresAbbreviationsAcknowledgementsIntroductionTinca Prunea-Bretonnet and Peter R. Anstey 1. The Four classes of the Berlin AcademyPeter R. Anstey2. ‘Mother of all sciences’ or mere speculation? The justification of metaphysics at the Berlin AcademyAnnelie Grosse3. Eclectic philosophy and ‘academic spirit’: the Berlin Academy and the Thomasian legacyTinca Prunea-Bretonnet4. In Search of a ‘golden mean’: experience and reasoning according to Louis de BeausobreAngela Ferraro5. Maupertuis, Euler and the Leibnizian metaphysics behind the Principle of least actionAnsgar Lyssy6. Euler and the reflexive origin of the idea of spaceChristian Leduc7. Experimental–Metaphysik at the Berlin Academy: the odd alliance between experience, mathematics and teleologyPaola Basso8. Origins of arts, origins of man in Sulzer’s academic essaysAlessandro NanniniAppendix: ‘On the duties of the academician’ by Pierre-Louis Moreau de MaupertuisList of ContributorsIndex