Updating Bergson

Book excerpt: Over the past few decades, there has been a renewal of scholarly interest in the work of Henri Bergson (1859–1941). At once a commentary and a stark re-evaluation of Bergson’s philosophy, Updating Bergson: A Philosophy of the Enduring Present argues that time should be thought of as a hierarchy of simultaneous durations, the shifting reality of which can be revealed by the philosophical method of intuition. A duration is a perpetually dynamic flow situated in the now. Put simply, for Bergson, change is the substance of things. Nothing exists apart from alteration. Adam Lovasz analyzes Bergson’s philosophy of time, encompassing the three basic types of duration—material, organic, and subjective—and also touches on themes such as relativity, evolution, the problem of materialism and idealism, and the topic of free will. Lovasz connects key questions addressed by Bergson to contemporary scientific debates and paradigms. Shedding new light on the various aspects of Bergson's philosophy, this book is both a provocation and an invitation to think in terms of the enduring present, rather than committing ourselves to a dead past or an absent future.