Henri Bergson is famous for his explorations of time as duration, yet he rarely referred to history in his writings. Simultaneously, historians and philosophers of history have generally disregarded Bergson's ideas about the nature of time. Modernity has brought change at an ever-accelerating rate, and one of the results of this has been a tendency toward presentism. Only the here and now matters, as past and future have been absorbed by the "omnipresent present" of the digital age. In highlighting the role of history in the work of Bergson, Bergson and History shows how his philosophy of life allows us to revise the modern conception of history. Bergson's philosophy situates history within a broader framework of life as a creative becoming, allowing us to rethink important topics in the study of history, such as historical time, the survival of the past, and historical progress.

Explores the philosophy of history of Henri Bergson and shows its relevance to contemporary historical thought. Henri Bergson is famous for his explorations of time as duration, yet he rarely referred to history in his writings. Simultaneously, historians and philosophers of history have generally disregarded Bergson’s ideas about the nature of time. Modernity has brought change at an ever-accelerating rate, and one of the results of this has been a tendency toward presentism. Only the here and now matters, as past and future have been absorbed by the “omnipresent present” of the digital age. In highlighting the role of history in the work of Bergson, Bergson and History shows how his philosophy of life allows us to revise the modern conception of history. Bergson’s philosophy situates history within a broader framework of life as a creative becoming, allowing us to rethink important topics in the study of history, such as historical time, the survival of the past, and historical progress. “Bergson and History is groundbreaking and merits a wide readership in the humanities and social sciences. It is full of fresh and original insights. Ter Schure has read widely and deeply, and there is a productive engagement throughout the book with contemporary resources.” — Keith Ansell-Pearson, author of Bergson: Thinking Beyond the Human Condition

Within the Western tradition, it was the philosophers Henri Bergson and Max Scheler who laid out and explored the nonrational power of "intuition" at work in human beings that plays a key role in orienting their thinking and action within the world. As author Adriana Alfaro Altamirano notes, Bergon's and Scheler's philosophical explorations, which paralleled similar developments by other modernist writers, artists, and political actors of the early twentieth century, can yield fruitful insights into the ideas and passions that animate politics in our own time. The Belief in Intuition shows that intuition (as Bergson and Scheler understood it) leads, first and foremost, to a conception of freedom that is especially suited for dealing with hierarchy, uncertainty, and alterity. Such a conception of freedom is grounded in a sense of individuality that remains true to its "inner multiplicity," thus providing a distinct contrast to and critique of the liberal notion of the self. Focusing on the complex inner lives that drive human action, as Bergson and Scheler did, leads us to appreciate the moral and empirical limits of liberal devices that mean to regulate our actions "from the outside." Such devices, like the law, may not only carry pernicious effects for freedom but, more troublingly, oftentimes "erase their traces," concealing the very ways in which they are detrimental to a richer experience of subjectivity. According to Alfaro Altamirano, Bergson's and Scheler's conception of intuition and personal authority puts contemporary discussions about populism in a different light: It shows that liberalism would only at its own peril deny the anthropological, moral, and political importance of the bearers of charismatic authority. Personal authority thus understood relies on a dense, but elusive, notion of personality, for which personal authority is not only consistent with freedom, but even contributes to it in decisive ways.

The explosive debate that transformed our views about time and scientific truth On April 6, 1922, in Paris, Albert Einstein and Henri Bergson publicly debated the nature of time. Einstein considered Bergson's theory of time to be a soft, psychological notion, irreconcilable with the quantitative realities of physics. Bergson, who gained fame as a philosopher by arguing that time should not be understood exclusively through the lens of science, criticized Einstein's theory of time for being a metaphysics grafted on to science, one that ignored the intuitive aspects of time. The Physicist and the Philosopher tells the remarkable story of how this explosive debate transformed our understanding of time and drove a rift between science and the humanities that persists today. Jimena Canales introduces readers to the revolutionary ideas of Einstein and Bergson, describes how they dramatically collided in Paris, and traces how this clash of worldviews reverberated across the twentieth century. She shows how it provoked responses from figures such as Bertrand Russell and Martin Heidegger, and carried repercussions for American pragmatism, logical positivism, phenomenology, and quantum mechanics. Canales explains how the new technologies of the period—such as wristwatches, radio, and film—helped to shape people’s conceptions of time and further polarized the public debate. She also discusses how Bergson and Einstein, toward the end of their lives, each reflected on his rival’s legacy—Bergson during the Nazi occupation of Paris and Einstein in the context of the first hydrogen bomb explosion. The Physicist and the Philosopher is a magisterial and revealing account that shows how scientific truth was placed on trial in a divided century marked by a new sense of time.

A thought-provoking contribution to the renaissance of interest in Bergson, this study brings him to a new generation of readers. Ansell-Pearson contends that there is a Bergsonian revolution, an upheaval in philosophy comparable in significance to those that we are more familiar with, from Kant to Nietzsche and Heidegger, that make up our intellectual modernity. The focus of the text is on Bergson's conception of philosophy as the discipline that seeks to 'think beyond the human condition'. Not that we are caught up in an existential predicament when the appeal is made to think beyond the human condition; rather that restricting philosophy to the human condition fails to appreciate the extent to which we are not simply creatures of habit and automatism, but also organisms involved in a creative evolution of becoming. Ansell-Pearson introduces the work of Bergson and core aspects of his innovative modes of thinking; examines his interest in Epicureanism; explores his interest in the self and in time and memory; presents Bergson on ethics and on religion, and illuminates Bergson on the art of life.

Henri Bergson (1859-1941) was one of the most celebrated and influential philosophers of the twentieth century. He was awarded in 1928 the Nobel prize for literature for his philosophical work, and his controversial ideas about time, memory and life shaped generations of thinkers, writers and artists. In this clear and engaging introduction, Mark Sinclair examines the full range of Bergson's work. The book sheds new light on familiar aspects of Bergson’s thought, but also examines often ignored aspects of his work, such as his philosophy of art, his philosophy of technology and the relation of his philosophical doctrines to his political commitments. After an illuminating overview of his life and work, chapters are devoted to the following topics: the experience of time as duration the experience of freedom memory mind and body laughter and humour knowledge art and creativity the élan vital as a theory of biological life ethics, religion, war and modern technology With a final chapter on his legacy, Bergson is an outstanding guide to one of the great philosophers. Including chapter summaries, annotated further reading and a glossary, it is essential reading for those interested in metaphysics, time, free will, aesthetics, the philosophy of biology, continental philosophy and the role of European intellectuals in World War I.