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1 Thinking beyond Platonism: Bergson’s “Introduction to Metaphysics” (1903)
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15 1 Thinking beyond Platonism: Bergson’s “Introduction to Metaphysics” (1903) Near the end of “Introduction to Metaphysics,” Bergson says, “The partial eclipse of metaphysics since the last half century has been caused more than anything else by the extraordinary difficulty the philosopher experiences today in making contact with a science already much too scattered” (CENT: 1432/CM: 200). Science has become scattered “today” because it is based on acquiring knowledge by analysis, that is, by taking up separate and particular viewpoints on things, from the exterior. Analysis is the work done by one faculty, the understanding (in French, l’entendement or, in German, der Verstand: the intellect). The understanding breaks things up and for each separate perspective, it assigns a symbol—so that knowledge looks to be based on symbols, relative to them, and metaphysics , based on relative knowledge, becomes impossible. For Bergson, analysis must be overcome. It is overcome by means of a different faculty, the faculty of intuition. Based in intuition, and not in symbolization, knowledge is immediate and absolute. Through intuition, then, metaphysics is possible once again. According to Bergson there is a second reason why metaphysics went into eclipse in the nineteenth century. In “Introduction to Metaphysics,” again near its end, Bergson speaks of modern philosophy as the reversal of Platonism, reversing the relation of idea (or form) and the soul (or experience). No doubt, Bergson is thinking of Descartes. Yet in the prioritization of the soul, Platonism persists insofar as the understanding —here too in modern metaphysics—defines cognitive activity. Here Bergson is thinking of Kant. No one more than Kant (the Kant of The Critique of Pure Reason, where the faculty of the understanding or the intellect, der Verstand, plays such an important role1 ), for Bergson has 16 · Early Twentieth-Century Continental Philosophy misunderstood the soul. Therefore, insofar as Bergson wants to overcome analysis, we can also say that he wants to overcome modern metaphysics. And if we can say that, then we can say that Bergson’s project bears strong similarities to Heidegger’s project of overcoming metaphysics.2 Nevertheless, as Heidegger and Husserl and perhaps Freud recognized , it is possible to overcome modern metaphysics only by adopting the discovery made by Descartes: immanence. For Bergson, as we shall see shortly, intuition is self-sympathy, even introspection. But the specific kind of introspection that Bergson thinks leads to absolute knowledge is not the slender experience of my current state of mind. Intuition for Bergson requires the effort to expand or dilate one’s present. Self-dilation puts us in contact with what Bergson famously calls the duration, the temporal flow of experience. This flow includes a kind of unity and a kind of multiplicity, a kind of continuity and a kind of heterogeneity, which means that through self-dilation I come into contact with something other than myself. Intuition does not enclose me, but opens me to the outside. In Bergsonian intuition therefore we find the basic impulse of all continental philosophy. Starting from a certain inside, it is driven by an impulse to exit. The impulse to the outside requires the reconception of thinking. Like Heidegger, Bergson too calls for such a reconception when he tries to reconceive the very concept of concept. He calls for this reconception because the duration is in itself inexpressible and yet knowledge of it given in intuition requires expression, even conceptual expression. In our “Interpretation,” we shall be particularly interested in Bergson’s new concept of concept. Just as the qualitative multiplicity of the duration sets the stage for all investigations of difference,3 the idea of a “fluid concept” sets the stage for all the investigations of language. It shows that thinking is capable of more than Platonizing. But first in our commentary, let us see what Bergson does with immanent subjective experience. Summary-Commentary: Intuition and Duration Analysis and Intuition4 The context for Bergson’s revival of metaphysics and intuition is the development of modern philosophy since Kant (CENT: 1427–28/CM: 195).5 Kant had made metaphysics impossible because he showed that human [54.159.186.146] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 13:51 GMT) Thinking Beyond Platonism · 17 knowledge is always and merely relative. For Bergson, however, our knowledge can be absolute (CENT: 1424/CM: 192). If our knowledge is absolute, then metaphysics is possible. For Bergson, the mistake Kant had made was that he relied on the “habitual work of the intelligence” (CENT: 1409/CM: 177). The habitual work of...