Time Is Not a Line: Bergson on Life, Duration, and Creative Evolution
Henri Bergson explodes clock-time with “durée” — lived, flowing, intuitive time — revealing memory, laughter, and life itself as an unstoppable creative surge against rigid mechanism.
Steps
- 1
- Reading· ~11 min
Memory, Consciousness, and the Living Present
What Bergson's theory of duration means for understanding memory and consciousness, and why it anticipates findings in contemporary neuroscience.
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- Reading· ~9 min
The Elan Vital and Creative Evolution
Bergson's most famous and most controversial idea, a theory of evolution that takes life's creativity seriously without abandoning science.
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- Text Explore· ~8 min
Duration, Memory, and the Elan Vital
Read the key formulations of Bergson's philosophy of time and life.
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- Argument Map· ~10 min
Time, Life, and Creative Evolution
Map Bergson's complete philosophy from duration through consciousness to evolution.
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- Dialogue· ~10 min
Dialogue: Is Duration Philosophically Coherent?
The hardest challenge to Bergson's account of time, and whether it survives rigorous scrutiny.
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- Reflection· ~8 min
Reflection: Your Relationship to Time
Bergson's philosophy of duration is most powerful when applied to the felt texture of your own experience of time.
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