TY - JOUR AU - Storni, Marco PY - 2019/01/01 Y2 - 2024/03/29 TI - Maupertuis’s Principle of Least Action: Epistemology and Metaphysics JF - Montesquieu.it JA - Mont VL - 11 IS - 1 SE - Articles DO - 10.6092/issn.2421-4124/9029 UR - https://montesquieu.unibo.it/article/view/9029 SP - AB - The paper deals with Pierre-Louis Moreau de Maupertuis’s (1698-1759) writings on the principle of least action (PLA). I discuss Maupertuis’s philosophical interpretation of the PLA by analysing three of his papers (1740, 1744, 1746), in order to assess the overall consistency of his argument. As I shall argue, Maupertuis presents the PLA as a universal principle of nature, this being at odds with the empiricist inspiration of his epistemology. Maupertuis’s attempt to introduce conceptual elements borrowed from the Leibnizian tradition into a Newtonian-inspired framework creates in fact a tension that is difficult to overcome. ER -