Method, Skepticism, Mathematics

On the basis of the standard academic Philosophy curriculum, the seminal work of Modern Epistemology is the Meditations.  Accordingly, the seminal Philosophical Method of the era is Skepticism.  However, that status of the work is belied by its being predated by not only the Novum Organum, but Descartes' other projects, as well.  Taking those into consideration, his Skepticism serves one specific purpose--to incorporate his deity into those other projects.  Once he accomplishes that in the Meditations, his real methodological innovation becomes clear, when the first application of the newly-gained Certainty is to Mathematics.  He thereby grounds the Method that surpasses Bacon, and has had a profound influence on history everywhere except in insular Philosophy--the quantification of Experience.  Accordingly, a significant factor in the Empiricist responses to Descartes, and, subsequently, Leibniz, is a counter to any thesis that Mathematical knowledge is innate.  But in sharp contrast to this Rationalism vs. Empiricism debate that dominates Philosophy for a few centuries, scientists recognize that the value of observation and Mathematics is as combined, i. e. as the method of quantifying evidence.  So, while Kant's system sometimes seems to be an attempt to reconcile Modern Rationalism and Modern Empiricism, it can also be interpreted as a formalization of a synthesis that already been widely actualized in that same period.