Rev. Roum. Philosophie, 66, 2, pp. 297–314, București, 2022 KANT ON METAPHYSICS AS SCIENCE MARIUS AUGUSTIN DRĂGHICI Abstract. My paper focuses on what and how Kant had accomplished with his intended “re- form of metaphysics” through “reason’s entering the secure path of science”. In this respect, I will argue that the influence of (pure) sciences on Kant’s programme was a major one, and this may be best highlighted if one assumes that he developed his mature theory only in the B edi- tion of his Critique (1787), where the influence of the model of pure a priori sciences turn to be decisive. This influence, as we already know, is closely related to the “reform of metaphysics” by “reason’s entering the secure path of science”. My claim is upheld also by the historical ar- gument that only in the Prolegomena (1783) and in the B edition of the Critique Kant explicitly conceived the idea of “metaphysics as science”. Therefore, the necessary steps in dealing with “metaphysics as science” must consider the A Critique, the Prolegomena, and the B Critique in this precise order. Assuming this order, my approach will involve three parts: in the first I will investigate the idea of the reform of metaphysics from the A Critique, in the second I will take into account “reason’s entering the secure path of science” (in the Prolegomena and the B Cri- tique), i.e., philosophy as science (the discipline within the B Critique); finally, I will argue that understanding Kant’s “idea of philosophy as science” can best be achieved by focusing on the role and place that pure sciences have in the transcendental philosophy of the B Critique, where its structure and content are themed and projected within the methodological frame of the “ex- periment of pure reason”. Keywords: Kant; transcendental philosophy; “experiment of pure reason”; metaphysics as sci- ence; reform. Kant considered his transcendental philosophy to be quite ahead of his time, that is, the 18 th century thinking, as proved by the way his contemporaries 1 “understood” 1 We only mention here the melodrama around the Göttingen Review, originally published anony- mously until the author revealed his identity after Kant’s summons; this review was known at the time as the Garve–Feder Review. Such a “misunderstanding” of Kant’s Critique was related to a more general and extended “misunderstanding” that lasts even nowadays: the attempt to understand exactly what Kant want- ed to say in his Critique. From this point of view, it was even more difficult to assume an adequate “under- standing” then, when Kant’s standpoint, although it had some “sources” in the worldview of the time, in its core was an absolute novelty. Marius Augustin Drăghici  “C. Rădulescu-Motru” Institute of Philosophy and Psychology of the Romanian Academy, Bucharest