“A ‘return to Bergson’ does not only mean a renewed -From the Afterword by the author, prepared especially for this edition “Bergsonism represents an important momentin Deleuze’s, development.” Review of Metaphysics “Meticulously translated...an enjoyable supplement to the growing list of Deleuze’s more important works..." The Times Higher Education ‘Supplement “This translation of Bergsonism is an important, welcome ‘addition to the English-speaking philosophical commu- nity. Deleuze elucidates and facilitates our comprehen- sion of Bergsor's original, fascinating, but difficult metaphysical idea that realty should be understood not in terms of space, but only in terms of ti Small Press Bergsonism By les Deleuze Translated by Hugh Tomlinson and Barbara Habberiam ZONE BOOKSBergsonism Gilles Deleuze Transiated by Hugh Tomlinson and Barbara Habberiam - NEW YORKing electronic, mechani is recording, or other (except for that copying permit Sand 108 ofthe ULS. Copyright Law and except by Contents Translator’: Introduction 7 References to Bergson’s Works 11 Intuition as Method 13 Duration as Immediate Datum 37 Memory as Virtual Coesistence 51 One or Many Durations? 73 Flan A Return to Bergson 115Translators’ Introduction Henri Bergson was one of the most important and philosophers of the first decades of the twentieth century, rnowaxlays his work seems to be almost forgotten. As Kolakow says, Today's philosophers, both in their research and in their teaching are almost entirely indifferent to his legac sonism is reduced to the status of a footnote in ‘or “irrationalism. But this fie impression is misleading, For Deleure, Bergson ike Lucretius, Spinoza, Hume or Nietzsche “who seemed to be part of the history philosophy, but who escaped from it in one respect or altogether.”? In the 1950s and 1960s, it was «writing about philosophers of this kind that enabled Deleure to make his escape from the scholasticism of post-war FrenchMy way of getting out of it at that time, was, I really think, to conceive of the history of philosophy as a kind of bug- gery or, what comes to the same thing, immaculate con- cep the back of an ch would be his and at the same time be a monster. It is very impor- had to say everything that Im: to be a monster because it was necessary to go through centerings, slips, break ins, secret emiss But Bergson is not just an exemplary target for the philo- sophical perversion of the early Deleuze. Bergson’s work has provided Deleuze with materials for his own tool box, for the manufacture of his own concepts and his own war machines. re Parnet, Ashe said to Bergson, of course, was also caught up in French-style his- tory of philosophy, and yet in him there is something which which enabled him to provide a ion, the object so much because of the actice of becom- cannot be assit shock, to be ar of'son theme of duration, as of the theory ings of all kinds, of coexistent mu Deleuze has himself taken up and transformed these Bergsonian notions in his own errant campaigns for constructive plur ism, re tracing the ntl ecomings of which m not by a mations of concepts borrowed from a range of writers from isciplines. Nevertheless, Deleuze and Bergson do have in common. In particular, preoccupied with the 'y to any master, but by a series of transfor- portant “problem: Deleuze’s work has been increasin; problems of “movement” and is recent isolation of the cinematographic concepts ime” which so concerned four “commentaries” on Bergson’s notions of movement, image, recognition and time.? The translation of the Bergsonian terms in the book pre- sents a special difficulty. Bergson's mother was from the north igland and he spoke the language from childhood. Many of his major works were translated du lifetime and per- sonally revised by him. We have not followed the terminol- ogy adopted in these translations in three respects. First in the authorized translations, the key term “dlan vital” is rendered as “vital impetus version is not an entirely “impetus,” from “momentum” through “surge” to “vigor! have thus followed the practice of recent writers on Bergson tal” in the French. Second, the authorized translations do not make a systematic distinction between We have invari- * and “memo altere pm the Bergson transla- the authorized translations have use 9as their rendering of is only suggests one of the range of senses in which Bergson uses the word, that is “relaxation,” in contrast to “contractis “de-tension”) — the Nixon-Brezhnev sense. It does not, however, convey the aning “spring” or “expan- sion.” Bergson often draws on this last sense which is used technically in thermodynamics to mean the expansion of a gas that has been previously subject to pressure. We have there- fore rendered “détente” by either “relaxation” or “expansion” depending on the context, with the original in parentheses. ‘We have followed the auth “dure” as “duration” and ado and “extensor to translate Bergson’s terms “étendue” and “extension.” We have translated both with the French word in parentheses. Deleuze often uses Kant's dis other word more active senses of the wor écare" and “intervalle” as “interval tinction between the “guaestio quid juris” and the “quaestio quid fact,” between the “question de droit” and the “question de fait.” We have translated “en foit” and “en droit” by “in fact” and “in principle.” We are grateful to Urzone, Inc. and particularly to Ramona Naddaff for suggesting that we translate this book. A number ids and colleagues have made suggestions and comments J us how English is supposed to read. In par- Hugh Tomlinson Barbara Habberjam London, December 1987 References to Bergson’s Works ‘TF Time and Free Will, translated by F.L, Pogson, London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd. New York: Macmillan & Co., 1919. Essai sur les données immédiates dela conscience, 1889. MM. Matter ond Memory, translated by Nancy Margaret Paul and W. Scott Palmer, London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1911. Matire et Mémoire, 1896. CE Creative Evolution, translated by Arthur Mitchell, New York: olt & Co., 1911 (New York: Macmillan & Co,, 1944). L'Evolution eréarice, 1907. ME tind-Energy, translated by H. Wildon Carr, New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1920. L’Energie spirtwelle, 1919. DS Duration and Simultaneity, translated by Leon Jacobson, Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1965. Durée et Simuleanéité, 1922. MR The Two Sources of Morality ond Religion, translated by Ashley Audra and Cloudesley Brereton with the assistance w. Carte snty Holt & Co., 1935. Les deux urces dela morale et de la religion, 1932. CM. The Creative Mind, translated by Mab Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1946. La Pensée et Henry New Yor! L. Andison, Je Mouvant, 19:References to the or references are to the 4th Cuarrer t Intuition as Method Duration, Memory, Elan Vtal mark the major stages of Bergson's philosophy. This book sets out to deter the rela- tionship between these three notions and, second, the progress they involve. Intuition is the method of Bergsonism. Intuition is neither Bergson calls point: Intuition, as he understan presupposes duration. “These con tion were, as it seemed to m 1g, he writes: “The theory of intu- han that of duration only became 24 precision analogous to enough, that duration wou ordinary sense of the word, if intuition — Bergsonian sense — were not there as method. the properly he fact is that philoso- tuition, the rel. » between Duration, Memory and Elan Vital woul knowledge. In all of these respects, we must bring intuition 48 rigorous or precise method to the forefront of our The most general methodological question is thi ion — which primarily ie knowledge (connaissance) — capable of forming a method, once it is accepted that the method essentially involves one or several mediation Bergson often presents intuition as a simple act. But, in his view, simplicity does not exclude a and virtual multi- ty; various directions in which it comes to be actualized. It is in this sense, then, that involves a plurality of meanings and irreducible multiple aspects. Bergson distin- ly three distinct sorts of acts that in turn deter- t concerns the stating the second, the discovery of genu- the apprehension of real time. ¥y showing how we move from one meaning to another and what the is, that we are able to rediscover the simpli on as lived act, and thus answer the general methodological question. iscussion.3 denotes an immes Finst Rute: Appl the tes of true and fake to problems themselves. Condemn false problems and reconcile truth and creation at the level of problems. wve that the true and the false can only be brought to bear on solutions, that they only begin with sol tions. This pre and the language that its its order-words [mots d'ordre], “set up” [donnen problems, as if they were drawn out of “the city We are wrong to ice is social (lors cover the solutions. In this way we are kept in a kind of slav- ery. True freedom lies in a power to decide, to constitute true ones. “The truth is that in philosophy and even else- where it is a question of finding the problem and consequently of positing it, even more than of solving it. For a speculative problem is solved as soon as it is prope that its solution exists then, although it may remain hidden and, s0 to speak, covered up: The only thi to do is to lem is not simply uncovering, uncover it. But stating the pro inventing. Discovery; or uncovering, has to do with what exists, actually or virtual never have happened. Ah I more in metaphysics, the effort of most of which it wi 5lem are here very close to being equivalent: The truly great problems are set forth on! are solved.”5 It is not just the whole history of mathematics that sup- ports Bergson. We might compare the last sentence of this extract from Bergson with Marx’s formulation, which is valid for practice itself: self problems that it is capable of solving, ying that problems are ions (the whole context suggests the contrary). Nor is ita ease of saying that only the problems count. On the contrary, tion that counts, but the problem always has the solution it deserves, in terms of the way in which it is stated (i.e., the conditions under which it is determined as problem), and of ‘the means and terms at our disposal for stating it. In this sense, the history of man, from the theoretical as much as from the practical point of view is that of the construction of problems. Ie is here that humanity makes its own history, and the becom- ty is like the conquest of freedom. when thi imanity only set neither example is it a case of s the shadow of pre-existing s is the solu- ig conscious of that acti (It is true that, in Bergson, the very notion of the problem has its roots beyond history, essentially determined in the act of avoiding obstacles, stat- ing and solving a problem. Th is both the stating of a problem and a solution.) But how can this constitutive power which res fe itself or in the lan vital: Life is construction of the organism relatively easy to define the true and the false in re solutions whose problems have already been stated, mucl ficult to say in what the true and the false con- sist when applied to the process of stating prob how many philosophers fall into circular arguments: Conscious of the need to take the test of true and false beyond sol more 6 into problems themse ork they are content to define the truth 'y of a problem by the possibility or impossibility of its being solved. Bergson’s great virtue, on the other hand, is to have attempted an nation of the false in the expression “false problem.” This is the source of a rule that is complementary to the preceding general trinsic deter ComPLeMeNtany Rutt: hake problems are of tvo sorts, “nonexistent problems,” defined as problems whose very terms contain a confusion of the “more” and the “less"; and “badly stated” questions, so defined because their terms represent badly analyzed composites. lustrate the first kind of problem Bergson cites the prob- ems of nonbeing, of disorder or of the possible (the problems of knowledge and being); as examples of the second type, there are the problems of freedom or of intensity.” His analyses of these are famous. In the fist case, they consist in showing that there is not Jes, but more in the idea of nonbeing than that of + in disorder than in order, in the possible than in the real. In the idea of nonbeing there is in fact the idea of being, plus 2 logical operation of generalized negation, plus the particu- lar psychological motive for that operation (such as when a being does not correspond to our expectation and we grasp it idea of disorder there is already the idea of order, plus its nega ion, plus the motive for that negation (when we encounter n order that is not the one we expected in the idea of the possible than there is in the idea of the real: image back into the past once it has enacted,” and the motive of that act (when we confuseniverse with a succession of the upsurge of a reality in ¢ states in a closed system). When we ask “Why ing?” or “Why is there or is there this rather than that (w' wwe fal We mistake the more for th g existed before being, disorder before ort nce. As though being there something rather than noth- ‘0 the same er the real to realize a pri tent are truth itself; but in the false problem there is a funda- mental them, by projecting an image of themselves back into a possi- , a disorder, a nonbeing which are supposed to be primor- This theme is a central one in Bergson’s philosophy: It forms as sources of false problems. Badly stated problems, the second type of false problem, ferent mechanism: This introduce a yzed composites that arbitrarily group things that differ in the question of whether happiness is t: Perhaps the term pleasure sub- , irreducible states, just like the idea of hap- iness. Ifthe terms do not correspond to “natural arti then the problem is false, for it does not affect “the very nature of things."? Here again, Bergson’s analyses are famous: for exam- ‘e one in which he condemns intensity as such a com- site. Whether the quality of the sensatio ith the muscular space that corresponds to it, or with the quan- 1 it isa case of badly is confused 8 are confused: that of terms juxtaposed in space and that of states which merge together in duration. " staken for the less. But there are also times when Bergson says that the less here is mistaken f just as doubt about an action only apparent! indicates a hal to what it denies, but only indicates a weakness in the person who denies. “For we feel that a divinely created will or thought itself, in the immensity of its re 00 ful ness incompatible with its nature, which is force. ... It is not 1g more but something less; itis a deficit of the will"! nnonbeing is sometimes presented as a more in relation to being ss? There is no contradiction if we bear in mind that what Bergson is condemning in nonexistent prob- king in terms of more and less. The idea of disorder appears when, instead of seeing that there are two or more irreducible orders (for exam that of life and that of mechanism, each present when the ), we retain only a general idea of order that we 1 ourselves to opposing to disorder and to th and sometimes as a -ms is the obsession in all is aspects with th ing in 19correlation wi appears whe wwe have already disregarded the two orders, oF between beings, between in the final analy- jsorder emerges from a general idea of order as badly analyzed composite, ete. And cone: ig in terms of more and less, seeing nothing but to the two aspects of the false problem, The very that we have to but against sus along, or respon notion of the false problem indeed imp! struggle not against simple mistake something more profou in which we are immerse ‘was Kant who showed that reason deep ngenders not mistakes but inevitable illusions, only + of which could be warded off. Although Bergson determines the nature of false problems in a com| 20 toll between true and false problems. Bergson shows clearly that intelligence 1 intuition decides between the true and the fal lems that are stated, evenBergson puts at the top of each page of his books indicate his ophy. What, therefore, composite must always be ision, Platonic in tion. Bergson is are mixed together in in fact, exper s. For example, we The awk- that representation the two component el in kind, the two pure presences of duration and extensity. We it hly that we can now only le that is assumed to be both nonspatial and nontemporal, and in relat ration and extensity, are now on ish the two pure presences 0 n, and we no longer see anything but d -n perception-recol perceptions. In short, we measure the mixtures a unit that is itself impure a y We have lost the ground powites. The obsession with the pure in Bergson goes back |. Only that which to this restor re be di J tendencies, that is, according to the irections of movements (hence dura- [détente}). Again, there intuition as method of division the composite represents the fact, it must be divided into tendenc onl toward the Kantian manner, the conditions ofall poss are the conditions of real experience). This is the Bergsonian leitmoti ferences in degree where there are Bergson groups his major cri ent forms, under this heading. 1 People have seen only dif- ics is that it sees ced time and an eternity which it assumes to be primary 1¢ ay deterioration, relaxation [détente] or diminution of I beings are del wed on a scale of intensity, between ;. But he directs degree, of position, of dimension, of proportion. There is even in evolutionism, to the extent that it postulates to another by simple interm transitions and variations e whole source of the false problems and the sions that overwhelm us isregard for true dif in kind: As early as the first chapter of Matter and nory, Bergson shows how the forgetting of differences in J —on the one hand srception and affection, on othe lection — givesrise to all ki the idea ‘ourselves states that we projec nal, so many misconcepti stated quest No text shows more chapter of Matter ipulation of to pure presences or ten\ cs that ¢ He asks, first, between what two things there may be (or may not be) a difference in kind. His first response is that, since the brain the elements ments among other movements, there cannot be a difference in kind between the faculty of the brain which is said to be per- ceptive and the reflex functions of the core. Thus, the brain does not manufacture representations, but only comp the relationship between a received movement (excitation) and an executed movement (response). Between the two, it estab- hes an interval (cart), whether it divides up the received finitely or prolongs it in a plurality of possibl of this interval reactions. Even if recollections take ad icated, more or less delayed. The wl awe also already have testion is knowing whether, in this wi iy effect, a being webri ject a ly those elements that interest him." So that perception 4 is not the object plus something, but the object minus some- thing, minus everything that does not interest us. It could be said that the object itself merges with a pure virtual percep- at the same time as our real perception merges with the ject from which it has abstracted only that which did not 's famous thesis (the full conse- interest us. Hence Bergson’ quences of where they are, perception puts us at once into matter, is imper= and coincides with the perceived object. Continuing on ine, the whole of Bergson's method consists, first in seeking the terms between which there could not be a here cannot be a difference in kind, but * a difference in degree between the faculty of the brain and the function of the core, between the perception of mat- terand matter itsel ference in ‘We are now in a position to trace out the second line, which differs in kind from the first. In order to establish the first we needed fictions: We assumed that the body was like a pure mathematical point in space, a pure instant, or a successi of instants in time. But these fictions were not simply hypoth- ‘They consisted in pushing beyond experience a direction drawn from experience itself. It is only in this way that we can extract a whole aspect of the conditions of experience. All that ¢ now is to ask ourselves what fills up the cerebral inter- val, what takes advantage of it to become embodied. Bergson's response is three-fold. First, there is affect that the body is something other than a m: ty, which assu point | which gives it volume in space. Next, it is the recollec- tions of memory that link the hemati stants to each other and inter- fe the past in the present. it is memory again in her form, in the form of a contraction of matter %duration in time that ich affectivity, ree yn-memory are ranged: These tion-memory, and contrac e ffer in kind from those of the preced- In short, representation ki llow themselves to be terms may be said to 1; line (perception-object-matte in general is divided into two into two pure presences that do not represented: that of perception which puts us at once into mat- ter and that of memory which puts us at once into the mind, ‘Once again, the question is not whether the two lines meet and mix together. This mixture is our exper representation. But all our false problems derive from the fact that we do not know how to go ance toward the conditions of experience, toward the articulations of the real, fers in kind in the composites that are lve. These two ats, perception ence itself, our and rediscover what given to us and on which and recollection, ‘exchanging something of their substance as by a process of end- osmosis. The proper office of psychologists would be to vray many difficult by metaphysics might be yy psychology and perhaps also But they will have it that ns, of And so ndemned to an ignorance alike of pure recollection we ar and of pure perception, to knowing only a single kind of phe- n and now per- ‘one or other ling between of the two aspects; and, consequently, t 26 perce not in kind,"2! Intuition leads us to go beyond the state of experience toward the conditions of experience. But these conditions are neither general nor abstract. They are no broader than the con- ioned: they are the conditions of real experience. Bergson speaks of go that dec tion only a difference degree and ve turn, where, taking a bias in the direction of our tt becomes properly human experience.”2? Above the ly the point at which we finally discover differ- But there are so many difficulties in trying to tuition, which are appar- cently contradictory, have to be multiplied. Bergson, thus, some- imes speaks of a movement that is exactly appropriate to the experience, sometimes a broadening out, sometimes a tight- ening and narrowing. For, in the first place, ofeach “line” involves a sort of contradiction in which appar- ently diverse facts are grouped according to their natural affini- , drawn together according to their articulation. But, on ‘we push each line beyond the turn, to the point where it goes beyond our own experience: an extraordinary ing out that forces us to think a pure perception iden- tical to the whole of matter, a pure memory totality of the past. It is in this sense that Bergson on several losophy to the proce- When we have benefitted in ntical to the they perceive of the real curve, “the curve itself into the darkness b them." In any case, abes a prop: on the thing h, in this sense, is wr when we have um in experience, ‘cover the point at which they intersect again, the tum in experience the ay does not go far enough: Truth itself, however, if two of them can be prolonged to the poin in experience as it were, both in a reverse direction: They con- ite what Bergson calls precision in philosophy. Hence, a COMPLEMENTARY RULE to the second rule:toatrue matter. But we on, the virtual point that he departure point. Thus the problem of soul and body, of matter and is only solved by an extreme narrowing in which Bergson shows how the lines of objectivity and of subjectivity, the lines of external obs vation and of internal experience, must converge at the of their different processes, all the way to the case of aphasia27 Bergson shows, similarly, that the problem of thi tality of the soul tends to be solved by the convergence of two end sent, mystical, experience.” The problems that at the point at which thre lines of facts converge are even more complex: Such is the nature of consciousness in the first chapter of Mind-Energ method of intersection forms a g defines a probabi of fact being qualitatively in the disarticulation of the real that they brought about according |, they already constituted a superior tinct. In their divergence, tothe jons. In their convergence, in the intersection of the real to which they proceed, they now define a superior probal ing the condition back to the con no distance remains between them, and of bri 30 Timp Rute: State problems and solve then in terms of time rather shan of space.® indamental meaning” of intuition: Intui- sts in thinking in terms of Jerstand it by retuming to the move- ment of the division determini rst sight it would seem chat a yetween two things, or rather between two tendenci uperficially. Let us consider the principal jon: that between duration and space. All the ns, all the other dualism the differences in kind. At is true, but only Bergsonian di other it, or resul allirming a difference in kind between duration and space. The ) duration, which “tends” for its part to take on or bear all the differences in kind (because it is ly confine ourselves to is quantitative homogeneity). There is thus between the two halves of the divi- (a8 with proportions and figures that vary greatly from case to case), we have: on the one hand, the aspect of space, by which he thing can only ever fer in degree from other things and iminution); and on the other hand, | ever grasp are other thingit also has a duration, a shythm of duration, a way of being in time that is at least partially revealed in the process of its dis- solving, and that shows how this sugar from other things, but first and foremost from itself. Th ation, which is one with the essence or the substance ofa thing, is what we grasp when we conceive of it in terms of Duration. ers in kind not only alter- broader meaning than is given ies that my own duration, such reveal other durations that beat to other rhythms, that differ in kind from mine. Duration is always the location and the environment of differences in kind; itis even their totality and tiplicity. There are no differences in kind except in dura- tion — while space is nothing other than the location, the environment, the totality of differences in degree. Perhaps we now have the means to resolve the most gen- method of. sion, he too tywo halves, or along several lines. But the whole problem lay ng how to choose the right half: Why was what we were look in kn¢ for on one side rather than on the other? Di method since it lacked a an inspiration. In Bergsonism, the appear. For by dividing the composite according to two tendencies, with only one showing the way in which a thing varies qui tatively in time, Bergson effectively gives himself the means of choosing the “right side” in each case; that of the essence. In short, intuition has become method, or rather method has been reconciled with the immediate. Intuition is not duration ty seems to, 2 ition is rather the movement by which we em duration, by which we make use of tion to affirm and immediately to recognize the existence of her durations, above or below u we are speaking, realism, to affirm the existence of objects both inferior and ly the method of w! sm as wel superior to us, though n sense, inte- - One perceives any number of durations, all very in fact the words infenor and superior id not mislead us, they denote di ntuition ax method, duration would re chological experience. Conversel the Let us return, therefore, to the illusion of false problems. Where does it come from and in what sense is it inevitable? into question the order of needs, of action, and in things; the order of intelligenc: space; and the order of general ideas that tends to obscure dif: wl. Or rather there are very in its natural affinity with rneral ideas resemblances in living bodies, others to objective identities ane! others again to sul in manufactured objects. But we are quick to form a general in inanimate bod jective demands ‘general ideas and to ment of generality into the homogeneity of the space which subtends them.”35 Bour nature, the “aspect and to us, only Now the st. ate of ‘ot be grasped in it. In short, there is a point of view, or a state of things, in which differences appear. The retrograde mo ind can no longer sion about the tru standpoint “we should perceive a series of transitions and, as ferences of degree, wh difference in kind. The illusion, therefore, does not result only from our nature, but from the wor in a certain sense, from the beginning to the er The two major aspects of his evol n seemed to him to be experience and became inst. things, providing the theme of a compl to a psycho- J the variable essence of n separating us from this psychological real it was itself gr rather, led in being and expressed one of its two 4 opes, one of its two directions. has two sides (aspects): spiri absolute, said Bergson, ued with metaphysis and mi things, when invites us to see ¢ this way, ‘With modern physics ferences in number behind our 28 It is, however, an illusion, But it in an absolute ore and ferences of proportion as matter and extension. an essenti ms and the ss out and i of duration). But how w, on the other han 6Cuapre Duration as Immediate Datum + is familiar with the deserip- chological experience as it appears the first pages of Creative Evolutio a case of a “transition,” of a “change,” a becoming, but itis a ecoming that endures, a change that is substance itself. The itis aso expe is already a cond without succession (in effect, the past; the recollection of what has Iready imply a mind at endures). ymbination space introduces s homogeneous luration contributes an its extrinsic distin 5" whi both heterogeneous and continuous. id discontinuous “sec 7decompose it into extemal parts and al geneous time. A composite of this kind (wh must be divided up. Even on as method c homogeneous directions, 0 (space) attain the ation) is pure, ty that denatures it.? Duration w te datum” because it is associated with On iccount, by the impure combination of homo It isa multiplicity of exteriority, of si sition, of order, of quantitative differentiation, of difference in degree; it is a numerical multiplicity, discontinuous and actual. The other type of multiplicity appears in pure duration: It is, ity of succession, of fusion, of organiza- or of dif- rernal multi tion, of heterogeneity, of qu ference in kinds iti jal and continuous mult ynot be rei 8 of distinguishing two types of muleipliciey. Now, thi problem goes back to a scholar of genius, jst and mathematic discrete multiplicities and continuous m tain the principle of their own metrics (the measure of one of their parts being given by the number of elements they con- tain). The latter found a metrical principle in something else, even if only in phenomena unfolding in them or in the forces acting in them. It is clear that Bergson, as a philosopher, was well aware of Riemann’s general problems. Not only his inter- est in mathematics points toward this, but, more specifically, Duration and Simultaneity is a book in which Bergson opposes ‘own doctrine to the theory of Relativity, which is directly dent on Riem ‘our hypothesis is correct, this book ' its doubly strange character. In the first place, it does not, appear abruptly and without explanation. Rather, it brings into pen a confrontation that until then, had been im] between Riemannian and Bergsonian interpretations of con- Bergson’s renunciation of this book is perhaps due to the fact that he able to pursue the mathematical implications ofa the- tiplicities. He had, in fact, profoundly changed the 39c sphere of icity as great as react upon science ‘ovo kinds of mul proper to duration ha that of science; mores and ope that of Riemann and the same as which Bergson, gives it renewed range and How is the qualitative and con tion defined, in opposition « s multiplicity of dura- significant respect as. n Matter and Memory. It ‘completely and adequately known; and the term objecti what is known in such a way that a constantly increasing \e idea which these for ions, we run the 40 den power, and that is why we can assimilate it to “the image. No doubt there can be moze in matter than in the image we have of of a differ- ent kind.6 And in another passage Bergson praises Berkeley for having assimilated body and idea, precisely because matter “has no interior, no underneath,...hides nothing, contains nothing. .. possesses neither power nor virtuality of any ki is no more than what it there cannot be anything else in is spread out as mere surface and. presents to us at any given moment. In short, “object bjectiv led, but what, in dividing, does not change in kind. Itis erences in degree.8 The object is char- and ” denote not only whavis his sense, the object will be ." For number, and primarily is the same as sayi degree, or that its differences, ral are always ac€ to imagine... While all mu the units in their turn ke, but are regarded sible for the purpose of compounding 1. Now, the very admission that it is pos- ito as many parts as we like, shows ity? What On the other hand, what is a qualitative is the subject or the subjective? Bergson gives the fol example: “A complex feeling will contain a fairly large num- ber of simple elements; but as long as these elements do not stand out with perfect cleamess, we cannot say that they were completely realized, and as soon as consciousness has a dis- tinct perception of them, the psychic state which results from ler in kind from the unconscious complex). It would there- fore be a serious mistake to think that duration was simply the although for convenience, Bergson often expresses ty, duration divides up and does so ‘multiplicity. But it does not divide changing in kind, it changes in kind in the pro- 2 That is w! other without ther ber exists only potenti the subjective, or duration, is the virtual. To be more precise, insofar a itis actu: 2 is inseparable from the movement ofits actualivation. For actur ation comes about through differentiation, through diver ws, and creates so many differences -verythi nt ts own movement ity; everything is not and is purely temporal: It moves from the it actualizes itself by creating lines fferentiation that correspond to its differences in kind. A of this kind has, essentially, the three properties continuity, heterogeneity, and simplicity. In this instance fficulty in reconciling het- Bergson does not have any real erogeneity and continuity. The aforementioned passage from Time and Free Wil, wherein e and the objective, appears all the more important insofar as it is the first to intro- irectly the notion of the virtual. come to play an increasingly important role in is notion of the hho develops the notion of th ases.a whole philosophy o irom a theory Th of multi ne and Multip| icity saves us from think- terms ‘There are many theories 8as. We are tol sis), then it ist that the © that Being passes into nonbeing and produces becomin passages where Bergson ¢: that the Self is one (thesis) and itis ty of the multiple (sy is already multiple, The nns this movement of abstract thought are among the finest in his oeuvre. To Bergson, it seems that in this type of dialectical method, one be that, like baggy clothes, are much too big? The One in gen- eral, the in general... In such ‘cases the real is recompoxed with abstracts; but of what use is a dialectic that believes itself to be reunited with the real when it compensates for the inadequacy of a concept that is too broad or too general by invoking the opposite concept, which is no less broad and general? The concrete w Ise we are tol s with concepts iple in general, nonbei be attained by combining the inadequacy of one concept with h another generali les cléments principaux de la représentation dates from 1907. Berg: sonism’s i ity with Hegelianism, indeed with any dialectical method, is also evident in these passages. Bergson lectie for being a fale movement, that ment of the abstract concept, which goes from one opposite of imprecision. isa Platonic tone in Bergson. Plato was to the other only by mea es tells us nothing; it forms a net so slack that everything slips through. Those metaphors of Plato about carving and the good cook (which Bergson likes so much) correspond to Bergson’s invocation of the good tailor and the well-fitted out- matters to philosophy is to know what uni ‘hat reality superior to the abstract one and the abs is the multiple unity of the person... Concepts...01 irs and represent the two opposites. There is ity upon which one cannot take two jews at the same time and that is consequently not and an antithesis which it would be vain for us to try logically to reconcile, for the simple reason that never, w' or points of view, will you make a th 1 try to an duration, that is, to resolve it into ready-made concepts, Lam { by the very nature of the concept and the analysis to take two opposing views of duration in general, with which I shall then claim to recompose it. This combination can present nei- ther a diversity of degrees nor a variety of forms: It is, or itis other hand, a unity which binds them together. Duration w be the synthesis of this unity and multiplicity, but how this mys- of shades or degrees, I repeat, is inst the dialectic, against a What Bergson cal eral conception of opposites (the One and the Multiple) — is an acute perception of the “what” and the “how ly because it is a multiplicity, a sed to becoming pre: 45duration is not at all the same than its simplicity is the same as Two forms of tive of simple limitation and the J that the subst ¢ of opposition, We are assur 1 of the second form for the frst by Kant and the post-Kantians was a revolution in philosophy. Ie is all the more remarkable that Bergson, in his critique of the negative, condemns both forms. Both seem to him to involve and to demonstrate the same inadequacy: For if we con- ‘gative notions like disorder or nonbeing, their very con- ception (from the starting-point of being and order as the limit whose interval all things are [anal g as our conceiving of them in opposition to being and order, as forces that exercise power and combine with their opposites to produce (syrithetically) all things. Bergson’s critique is thus a dou condemns, in both forms of the negative, the same ignorance € one insofar as it sometimes as oppositions. The heart of Bergson’s is to think c negatio Proj forms ing negative. Negation always involves abstract concepts that are much too general. What is, fact, the common root of all negation? We have already s nstead of starting out from a difference in kind between two orders, from a ence in kind between two beings, a general idea of order oF 46 + be thought except in order in general, or point of adeteri- ing is created, which can no lon ig in gener sorder in general or to nonbeing in jerence in kind — “what” any case, the quest ‘order? “what” being? ~ has been neglected. Likewise the dif- in kind between the two types of multiplicity has been Thus a general idea of the One is created and is n general, to recon- combined with its opposite, the Multiph struct all things from the standpoint of the force opposed to ple or to the deterioration of the One. In fact, with the difference in is the category of . between two types that it involves, which enables us to con- egative of limitation, of the negative of oppo- a critique of the sition, of geners we analyze in the same way the concept of motion. a fact, movement as physical experience is itself a composite: n the one hand, the space traversed by the moving object, whose parts — real or possible — are actual and differ only ree; on the other hand, pure movement, which is alter into steps, but which changes qualitatively 18 Bergson discovers that beneath the yance of another nature. ide to be a numerical part, a com- 4”ponent of the run, tums 0 an obstacle avoid But in doubl to be, experienced from of duration ovement, one problem be Do external things enduré ferminate from the standpoint of psychol ill, Bergson invoked! reason — “What duration is there ex: sent of jon, simulta ‘external things change, but their moments ¢ if we prefer the expre: ty: No doubt not succeed (in the ordinary sense of the word) one another, except for a con- sciousness that keeps them in mind nce we must not say that external things endure, but rather that there is some rexpressible reason in them which accounts for our inal to examine them at successive moments of our 6 n duration hough things theless, there must be without observing that they have changed.” — do not endure as we do ourselves, ne some incomprehensible reason why ph succeed one another instead of being set out all at once However, Time and Free Will already had an analysis of move- ‘ment. But movement had be omena are seen to implying a conscious and enduring subject con- h duration as psycho the extent that movement is grasped as belonging to things as much as to consciousness that it ceases to be confused psychological duration, whose point of a place, thereby necessitating that things part I qualities exist in things no less t in consciousness, if there is a movement of qual duration things must, of necessity, endure in their own way. Psy= 4s ies, in what sense can it be in what sense can there be to be a single one; in what sense can one get beyond the | problem now there is d ontological alternative of one/several? A rel becomes more urgent. If things endure, or in things, the que: ‘ew foundations. For space will no longer simply be a form sxteriority, a sort of screen that ty that comes to disturb the pure, a relative that is opposed absolute: Space itself will need to be based in things, in relations between things and between durations, to belong self to the absolute, to have its own “purity.” This was to be the double progression of the Bergsonian philosophy. ation n of space will need to be reassessed on natures duration, an impu- 49rer | Memory as Virtual Coexistence Duration is essentially memory, consciousness an ciousness and freedom because , Bergson always presents this freedom. is primarily memory. lentity of memory and the past in the present.” Or else “whether the present distinctly 1e ever-growing image of the past, or whether by ity attests rather to the increas- long behind one the older one jemory in these two forms, covering as does with a cloak of recollections a core o! ception, and also contracting a number of ex In fact we should express in two ways the manner in which mediate per- mal moments.”! inguished from a discontinuous series of instants : On the one hand, “the lowing moment ver and above the preceding one, it the two moments into each other since one has not yet here are, ther inked aspects of memory— ory the latter has re, WO stwed toward toward the future). special problem of memory is: How, by what mechanism, does ie itself? In the same way, Berg ciple, coextensi 1 what conditions, does life in fact become consciousness? Let us resume the ana Memory. We are led to the moment conti ry of things and holds back every= thing that interests it about the object, letting the rest go b terval or o us the means of “choosing” that which corresponds to our ne val between recei choice between ts to choose subject 1; perception does brain bring abou terval without the assurance that certain organic parts are pmmitted to the immobility of a purely receptive role that surrenders them to pain); (4) recollection-subjec aspect of me or does the intervalle]); (5) contraction-subjectivity, the sec~ cond aspect of memory (the body being no more a punctiform instant in time than a mathematics ing about a contraction of the experienced excitations from which quality is born). Now, these five aspects are not merely organized in order creasing depth, but are distributed on two very different lines of facts. The first chapter of Matter and Memory sets out to decom pose a composite (Representation) in two divergent directions: ‘matter and memory, perception and recollection, objective and ective (cf. the two multiplicities of Time and Free Will). OF five aspects of subjectivity, the two obviously belong first confines itself to abstract- turbs the latter.* The province of the pure line of sub- jectivity is thus the fourth, and then the fifth sense. Only the two aspects of memory strictly signify subjectivity; the other 3meanings cor jut the insertion of on with the other. ine themselves to making way for or b ine into the other, the intersection The question “Where are recollections preserved?" involves a false problem, that is to say, a badly analys. is as though recollections had to be preserved somewhere, as though, fr example, the brain were capable of preserving them, But the brain is wholly on th here can- vrence in kind between the other states of mat- brain, For in the latter te. Ie serything is movement, a5 (And yet the term must not be understoo the sense of the pure perce ‘movement obvious enduring movement, but on the contrary asa section.”)$ Recollection, on the contrary is part of the line of stantaneous of the brain as the reservoir or the substratum of recolle Moreover, an examination of the second line would be su ons do not have to be pr duration, Recollection therefore is pre- T become aware o cient to show that rec anywhere other than sened in itself, Only then inward experience in the pure state, in gi essence is to endure and consequently to prolong into the present an indestructible past, would have wed me from ing us a ‘substan whose ver continu ven have on is preserved. It preserves itse rest in presupposing a preserv to seek, where re have no, of the past elsewhere brain, in its ¢ tion that we have denied to even on the whole of matter. We are touching on one ration on a state of matter, or most profound, but perhaps also one of the least understood, aspects of Bergsonism: the theory of memory: There must be a difference in kind between matter and memory, between pure perception and pure rec- -ve that the past is no longer, that it has ceased to be. We we thus confused Being with being-present. Nevertheless, the resent isnot; rather, it is pure becoming, always outs Ik is not, but it acts. Its proper element is not being active or the useful. The past, on the other hand, has ceased to act or to be usefull. But it has not ceased to be. Useless and 1S, in the full sense of the word: It is consummated and places it, the ordinary determina- ent, we must say at every instant and of the past, that it This is the difference in kind between the past and the present.8 But this first aspect of the Bergsonian lose all sense if its extr psychological range were has ied virtual, ictive, and unconscious. All these words are dangerous, in lar, the word which, inseparable from an especially eflective and active psy- partic nce Freud, has ssche Fre self made the comparison.” We must nevertheless be clear at this point that Bergson does not use the word “unconscious” y outside consciousness, but I existe . We will have occasion to compare the wconscious with the Bergsonian, since Bergson him- recollection has only ontological ble passage where Bergson sumn- s theory. When we look for a recollec- ‘We become conscious of an act sui generis Let us now marizes the whole of tion that escapes us, by which we detach ourselves from the present in order to the past in general, the replace ourselves acertain the focusing of a camera, But our recollection still remains vir~ tual; we simply prepare ourselves to receive it by adopting the ike a passes into the ly psychologi- cal interpretation of the text. Bergson does indeed speak of a re again, one must avoid psychological act; bu act is “sui generis,” this is because it has made a genuine Jeap. We place ourselves at once in the past; we leap into the past as into a proper element.!? In the same way that we do not perceive things in ourselves, but at the place where they are, we only grasp the past at the place where it isin itse in our present. There is therefore a “past in general” that is not of a particular present but that a past that is eter: passage” of every particular present. It is the past in gener: and not in ourse 6 that makes possible all pasts. According to Bergson, we first put ourselves back into the past in general: He describes then, once the ly take on a psychological passes into the actual state have had to search at the place w ve give it an embod s between this text and some others must be For Bergson analyzes language in the same way as that recollect tence: “from the virtual rocomposing sense on the basis of sounds that are heard and ass the element of sense, then in a region of this element. A true leap into Bein, Ie is only then that sense is actualized in the psychologi sounds, and in the images that are psychologically associated with the sounds. Here there is a kind of transcen- dance of sense and an ontological foundation of language that, as we shall see, are particularly important in the work of an author whose red to have been overly hasty.!3 We must place ourselves at once in the past — in a leap, imp. Here ag: is strange in the work of a philosopher who is considered to be so attached to continuity. What does it mean? Bergson con- never recompose the past with presents, The image pure and jot take me back to the past unless, indeed, it was in the past ed images, we place ounelves at onc this almost Kirkegaardian idea of a “leap 7that I sought it." The past, it is true, seems to be caught between two presents: the old present that it once was and the actual present in relation to which it is now past. Two false beliefs are derived from this: On the one hand, we believe that the past as such is only constituted after having been present; ‘on the other hand, that it isin some way reconstituted by the new present whose past the heart of all physiological and psychological theories of memory. When one is influenced by such an illusion, one assumes that there is only a difference in degree between rec ollection and perception. We are thus entangled in a badly ana- lyzed composite. This composite is the image as psychological . The image in effect retains something of the regions where we have had to look for the recollection that it actual- now is. This double illusion is at t to the requirements of the present; it makes the present. Thus, we substitute the sim= ple differences in degree between recollection-images and perception-images for the difference cent and the past, between pure perception and pure memory. We are too accustomed to thinking in terms of t not pass at the same time that itis present? How wou any present whatsoever pass, were not past at the same time never be constituted if it had not at the same time that it was pres- is here, as it were, a fundamental position of time and also the most profound paradox of memory: The as” with the present that it has been. Ifthe past “contemporan 58 had to wait in order to be no longer, if it was not immediately and now that it had passed become what it i past in general,” it could never it would never be that past. IF it were not constitut be reconstituted on never be con- basis of an ulterior present. The past wou with the present whose past it present do not denote two successive stituted id not cox ‘The past a moments, but two elements which coexist: One is the present, which does not cease to pass, and the other is the past, which does not cease to be but through which all presents pass. in this sense that there is a pure past, a kind of “past in gen- eral”: The past does not follow the present, but on the con- is presupposed by it as the pure condition without w would not pass. In other words, each present goes back to itself as past. The only equivalent thesis is Plato's notion of Reminiscence. The reminiscence also affirms a pure being of the past, a being in itself of the past, an ontological Memory that is capable of serving as the foundation for the unfolding time. Yet again, a Platonic inspiration makes itself profoundly in Bergson. '6 ‘The idea of a contemporaneity of the present and the past has one final consequence: Not only does the past coexist present that has been, but, as it preserves itself in it (while the present passes), it is the whole, integral pasts ‘our past, which coexists with each present. The famous metaphor of the cone represents this complete state of coex- implies, finally, that in the past itself levels of profundity, marking all the is coexistence.!7 The past AB coexists with the present S, but b V'B', ANB", etc. istence, But such a stat e appear all kinds possible interval \ding in itself all the sections at measure the degrees of a purely ideal ”proximity or distance in relation to S. Each of these sections is itself virtual, belonging to the being in itself of the past.!9 Each of these sections or each of these levels includes not par ular elements of the past, but always the totality ofthe past. is totality at a more or less expanded or contracted the precise point at which contraction-Memory ith recollection-Memory and, in a way, takes over from jergsonian duration is, int In Time and Free Will duration is really defined by succession, coexistences referring back to space, and by the power of nov- elty, re ferring back to Matter. But, more profoundly, duration is only succession relatively speaking (we have seen in the same way that it iso is indeed real succession, epetition of a com letely different type than the “phy petition of mat- 60 ter: a repetition of “plane irtual instead of actual repetition. The whole of our past is played, restarts, repeats itself, at the same time, on all the levels that it sketches out.!? Let us return to the ather than of elements on a single we make whei {is not a case of one region con- taining particular elements of the past, particular recollections, in opposition to another region which contains other recol- lections. It is a case of there being distinct levels, each one of which contains the whole of our past, but in a more or less contracted state, It is in this sense that one can speak of the regions of Being itself, the ontological regions of the past * ” one another. Later we shall see how this doctrine revives all the prob- -ms of Bergsonism. However, at this point it is enough to sum- ‘marize the four main propositions that form as many paradoxes: (1) we place ourselves at once, in a leap, in the ontological ele- ment of the past (paradox of the leap); (2) there is a difference kind between the present and the past (paradox of Bei els of contraction and repetition). These para dependent on the others. attack also form a group, ing ostitute the past with the prese ‘one to the other; (3) that they are and an after; and (4) that the work of the mi by the a genuine jumps, the reworking of systems).22 2) we pass gradual ion of elements (rather than by changes of level, this pure virtual be actu in a particular region, that kind of Reminiscence, we assume corresponds to our actual needs, Each level in effect contains the totality of our past, but in a more or less contracted state. And Bergson adds: There are also dominant recollections, like remarkable points, which 1 to the other" A foreign word is spoken in my presence: the situation this is not the same thing as wondering what the language in general, of which this word it person once said this word, or a «do not leap into do not place myself on the same ng on the same region of the past level; | do not appeal to the same essential charact haps [ fail: Looking for a recollectio: level that is too contract broad and expanded for it. 1 would then have to start from the beginning again in order to find the correct leap. We must , which seems to have so much psy- has a quite different meanin; |, too narrow, or on the contrary, oo 62 and to the variety of this ycholog ness has not yet been born. It will be born, but precisely has found its proper ontological conditions here. Faced with these extremely difficult texts, the task of the commentator is to multiply the distinctions, even and above all when these texts confine themselves to suggesting the dis- tinction, rather than to establishing them strictl must not confuse the appeal to recollection and the “recal nage” (or its evocation). The appeal to recollection is this jump by which I place myself in the virtual, in the past, in a particular region of the past, at a particular level of contrac- tion. It appears that this appeal expresses the properly onto- logical dimension of man or, rather, of memory: “But our recollection still remains virtual.”2? When, on the other hand, wwe speak of evocation, or of this recall of the image, some- thing completely different is involved: Once we have put our- selves on a particular level where recollections lie, then, and only then, do they tend to be actualized. The appeal of the present is such that they no longer have the ineflectiveness, the impassivity that characterized them as pure rect they become recollection-images, capable of being “recalled.” They are actualized or embod of distinct aspects, stages, and degrees.23 But through these stages and these degrees it is the actualization (and it alone) that constitutes psychological consciousness. In any case, the Bergsonian revolution is clear: We do not move from the pre- sent to the past, from perception to recollection, but from the past to the present, from recollection to perception, lemory, laden with the whole of the past, responds to the of the present state by two simultaneous movements, of translation, by whi n its entirety to meet expe- because lections; appe 63and levels of the past Bergson’s con invokes transl I are no Tee va noreover, each one of them cont: regions of the past, th in general: ions. The extent of the con- -e between one level n Bergson speaks the cone. This, I reasons. In cone, even a level that i lose to the summit — so long as i plays a genuine difference in from the present. Furthermore, i metaphor of here is contracti age enters into a “coal lence the need to avoid confusing the planes of «consciousness, through which recollection is actualized, and the of the past, according to which the (however relaxed [détendu] it is) must its process to carrying outof this rotation. We must make hypotheses on texts. In the movement of translation, it is ized at the same time as a par- lection. Each level thus finds itself contrac ded representation that is no longer a pure re mn undoubte ow do we become conscious o distinguish it in the region that is actualized w t, how do we We begin he process ip of reciprocal penetration; s that are external to one traction. It is, on the contrary, that of a division, a develop- ‘ment, an expansion. Rec to be actu- t, that it but into a kind of n-Image referring back to the perception-image and vice versa” Hence the preceding h prepares the ground for this lection can only be sai ircuit with the present, the recol metaphor of “rotation” wh launch into the circu Thus, we have here two movements of actu: ization: one 1 one of expansion. We can see clearly that they correspond closely to the multiph expanded (détendus), some contracted. For what happens in a creature that confines itse present situation req) of contr levels of the cone, some terest,” it is as if the contraction were miss- extremely expanded (détendu) relationship of the most expands what would hap- persion were jon with the present reproduced (détendu) level of the past itself. Conv tween s of the cone and the aspects of actualization I is inevitable that the Latter will come to include the former (hence the ambiguity that has already been pointed out). Nevertheless, we must not confuse them because the first theme concems the virtual variations of recollection in itselt the other, recollection for us, the actualization of the reco lection in the ion-image. What is the framework common to recollection in the pro- tion (the recollection-becoming-image) and the 1age? This common framework is movement. ces of actual is extended naturally, 1, a motor scheme, carries out a 32 This decomposition of the perceived in terms of uti jonship wo 1e a recognition that is purely automatic, with- tion of recollections (or, if you prefer, an in motor mecha- tervene. For, insofar as es resemble actual perception, they are nec- owever, rec 6they become Let us assume for a mom: ception an movement-perception-articulation, a mechanical disturbance of the motor scheme: Recognition has become impossible (al- though another type of recognition subsists, as we see in those patients who clearly describe an object that is named to th but who do not know how reetly repeat what is sai to speak spontaneously make use” of -m, but no longer know how The patient no longer knows how to orient himself, how to draw, that object according to the motor tenden fuse movements. Nevertheless, the recolle are there, Moreover, they continue to be evoked, to be embod- ied in distinct images, that is, to undergo the translation and rotation that characterize the first moments of actual What is lacking ¢ thi t, the final phase: that of action. Just as the concomitant movements of percep- rgani useless, as ineffective as a pure recollection, and can no longer ‘extend itself into action. This is the first important fact: despite psychic or ver- how to decompose an lis perception only provokes ation. for final mom: tion are the recollection-image also remains as s of an attentive rec~ onger a matter of movements that “ ‘extend our perception decompose the object according to our nee ‘ments that abandon the effect, that bring us back to the object and completeness. Then the recol- lection-images — which are analogous to present perception — in order to restore its d 68 take on a role that is “preponderant and no longer merely ssory,” regular and no longer accidental.’ Let us assume that this second kind of movernent is sturbance the sensory motor funk iat is dynamic, and no longer possible for automatic recognition to remain, it what does appear to have disappeared is recollection itself. Because such cases are the most frequent they have inspired the traditional conception of aphasia as the disappearance of re stored in the brain. Bergson's whole problem is: ‘What has really disappear First hypo it pure recollection? Obviously not, since sure recollection is not psychological in nature and is imper- Is it the capacity to evoke recol- tion, that is, to actualize it in a recollection-image? At times, Bergson does express himself in this way..7 Nevertheless, it is more complicated than this, For the first two aspects of actu- alization (translation and rotation) depend on a psychic at the last two (the two types of movement) depend on sensory-motricity and the attitudes of bodies. Whatever the solidarity and complementarity of these two dimensions, the ‘one cannot completely cancel out the other. When only the jon are affected (mechanical tomatic movements of isturbances of sensory-motricity), recollection nevertheless retains its psychic actualization; it preserves its but can no longer extend itself in move- stage of its actualization having become e recognition are affected (dynamic disturbances of sensory-motricity), psychi- loubtedly more case for here the corporeal atti | actualization is yered than in the prec ide really is a con- ion of the mental attitude. Bergson nevertheless mai 69c." There is ‘We must perhaps understand that the two psychic asp n sub- sist but are, sociated for want of a corporeal atti- ich they could be inserted and combined. Sometimes 8 of actualizat images would form, but they would be detached from memory and abandon their solidarity with the others. In any cas not sufficient to say that, according to Bergson, tion always preserves ‘ction-image as such, but merel tion and rotation, which form the properly psychic moment dynamic move ical movement, the motor scheme that rep- tage of act mn of the past to the present, the ut terms of the present ~ what Bergson The first moment ensures a point of contact betwee! and the present: The past ly moves toward ensures a transposition, a translation, an expansion of the past 70. present. But ing if the four moments not connected |. We have seen that n must be embodied, not in terms ofits own pre= ccontemporancous),b Recollect sent (with w present, which con- an inter turbance corresponding to this last aspect wou the “recollection of the preseto become embodied, they exert pressure to be admitted so that a fi le repression originating in the present and an “attention to life” are necessary to ward off useless or danger- ous recollections." There is no contrad jon between these two descriptions of two distinct unconsciousnesses. Moreover, the whole of Matter and Memory plays between the two, with consequences that we shall analyze later. n Cuaprer IV One or Many Durations? Thus far, the Bergsonian method has shown two main aspects, the one dualist, the other monist. First, the diverging lines or the differences in kind had to be followed beyond the “turn in experience”; then, still further beyond, the point of con- vergence of these lines had to be rediscovered, and the rights ‘ofa new monism restored.! This program is in fact realized in Matter and Memory. First, we bring out the difference between the two lines of object and subject: between percep- tion and recollection, matter and memory, present and past. What happens then? It certainly scems that when the recol- ction is actualized, its difference in kind from perce| tends to be obliterated: There are no longer, there can no longer be, anything but differences in degree between recol- lection s for thi images and perception-images.? | that, without the method of intui prisoners of a badly analyzed psychological comp ginal differences in kind we are unable to discem. But itis clear that, at this level, a genuine point of unity is, ible. The point of unity must account for a com- posite from the other side of the tum in experience; it must not ably remain ¢ whose Bbe confused with the one in experience. And in fact, Bergson is not content to say that there are now only differences degree between the recollecti image. He also presents a much more important ontological Proposition: While the past coexists with its own present, and whi it coexists with itself on various levels of contraction, we must recog nize thatthe present itself is only the mast contracted level of the past. This ti ure present and pure past, pure perception and pure recollection as such, pure matter and pure memory that now have only diflerences of expansion (détente) and contrac- mand thus rediscover an ontological unity. But discovering a deeper contraction-memory at the heart of recollection memory we have thus laid the foundations for the pos of anew monism. At each instant, our perception contracts “an incalculable multitude of rememorized elements”; at each instant, our present infinitely contracts our past: “The two terms which had been separated to begin with cohere closely together. tis the operation of contracting trillions of vibrations onto a receptive surface xe and the perception: contracted quantity. This is how the notion of contraction (or of tension) allows us to go beyond the ¢ quantity and heterogeneous qu: in a continuous movement. But, h which we place oursel ‘our past, matter itself ed (détendu) past (so laxation (détente) — or of ty of the unextended and extended and give us the means of passing from one to the extension ~ will overcome th th ” other. For perception itself is exte extensive sofar as what it contracts is precis expanded (détendu). (It makes space tous" proportion” in v ble) lence, the importance of Matter and Memory: Movement is, the exten the exact +h we have time avai ment is no less outside me than in me; turn is only one case among others in duration.’ But then a Kinds of problems arise. Let us single out two important ones. (1) Is there not a contradiction between the two moments of the method, between the dualism of differences in kind and the monism of contraction-relaxation (détente)? For, in the name of the first, philosophies that confine themselves to dif- ferences of degree, of intensity were condemned. Moreover, what were condemned were the false notions sity, as notions of contrariety or negation, sources of all false problems. Isn't Bergson now in the process of restoring all that he once dismissed? What differences can there be between relaxation (détente) and contraction except for the differences ‘of degree, of intensity? The present is only degree of the past, matter the most relaxed (détendu) degree Of the present (mens momentanea).® And if we seek to correct what is too “gradual” here, we can only do so by reintrodue- degree, of inten- the most contracted ng into duration al Bergson had prev on of mat- ion of duration by embracing a concey ter that isa “reversal” of duration.? What then becomes of the Bergsonian project of showing that Difference, as difference 75in kind, could and should be understood independently of the negative (the negative of deterioration as well as the negative of opposition)? The worst contradiction of all seems to be set up at the heart of the system. Everything is reintroduced: degrees, intensity, opposition. (2) Even supposing that this problem is solved, can we speak of a rediscovered monism? In one sense everything is duration. But, since duration is lowing question: Is duration one or many, and in what sense? Have we really overcome dualism, or have we been engulfed in pluralism? We must begin with this question. Bergson’s texts seem to vary considerably on this Matter ‘and Memory goes furthest in the affirmation of a radical plur of durations: The upiverse is made up of modifications, dis- turbances, changes of tension and of energy, and nothing else. Bergson does indeed speak of a plural but in this context he makes it clear — in relation to durations that are more or less slow or fast ~ that each duration is an absolute, and that each rhythm is itself a duration.* In a key text from 1903, he insists on the progress made since Time and Free Will: Psychological duration, our duration, is now only one case among others, among an infinity of others, “a certain ined tension, whose very de! ke a choice between an infinity of possible durations.” We can see that, as in Matter and Memory, psychology is now only an open- 1g onto ontology, a springboard c if ran “installation’ 76 But no sooner are we installed, than we perceive that Being multiple, the very numerous duration, our own, caught yetween more dispersed durations and more taut (tendue), being, but the relationship of al things with being. Everything happens as if the universe were a tremendous Memory. And Bergson is pleased with the power of the method of intuition: > It alone enables us “to go beyond idealism as well as realism, to affirm the existence of objects which are inferior and superior to ourselves, although still, in a certain sens to make them coexist together without difficul extension of virtual coexistence to an infinity of specific durations stands out clearly in Creative Evolution, where life itself is compared to to endure, it is less in themselves or If things are than in relation to the Whole of the universe in -y participate insofar as their distinctions are arti . Thus, the piece of sugar only makes us wait because, in spite of its arbitrary cary asa whol g out, it opens out onto the uni each thing no longer has its own dura- tion. The only ones that do are the beings similar to us (psy- * logical duration), then the living beings that natural loved systems, and finally, the Whole of the uni- |, pluralism. verse.!! It is thusa limited, not a general ”potheses: gener: mited pluralism, According to the first, there is a coexistence of tinct, hence a radical multipl he once ad at edd see then, we still see today, no reason to extend this hypothe- sis of a multi rations to the material universe.” Hence, a second hypothesis: Material things outside us would not be distinguished by absol ferent durations but by a certain relative way of participating in our duration and of iving it emphasis. Here it seems that Bergson is condensing the provisional doctrine of Time and Free Will (there is, as it were, mysterious participation of things in our duration, an “inex- pressible ground”) and the more develop. Evolution (this participation in our duration would be explained by things belonging to the Whole of the universe). But even this second case, the mystery about the nature of the Whole our relationship with it remains. Hence, the third hy} ime, a single duration, in w everything would participate, including our consciousnes: inclu ng beings, inclu Now, to the reader's surprise, it is th igpeticis tat Bergson puts forward as the most satisfactory: a single Time, one, univer- sal, impersonal. be more surprising; one of the other two hypotheses would seem to be a better expression of the state of Bergsonism, whether after Matter and Memory or after Creative Evolation. What more: Has Bergson forgotten that in Time and Free Will he ly doctrine of Creative In short, a monism of B What has happened? Undoubtedly the confrontation with vity. This confrontation was forced on for its part, invoked concepts such ity, which Einstein drew from Riemann, and which Bergson for his part had used in Time and Free Will. Let us recall, bri he principal characteristics of Einstein's theory, as Bergson sum- marizes them: Everything begins from a certain idea of move- ment that entails a contraction of bodies and a dilation of their imultancous in a fixed system ceases be simultaneous in a mobile system. Moreover, by virtue of the relativity of rest and movement, by virtue of the rela- ity even of accelerated movement, these contractions of extensity, these dilations of time, these ruptures of simulta- ity become absolutely reciprocal. In this sense there would be a multiplicity of times, a plurality of times, with different speeds of flow, all real, each one peculiar to a system of refer- ‘ence. And as it becomes necessary, in order to situate a point, jon of space. It is precisely divides up into space and toasystem. mn, that is to say time, is ity, But the problem is: What type of ty? Remember that Bergson opposed two types of ”ty — actual mul ing, as a result, revived the confusion of time with space. The discussion only apparently deals with the q m is “What is the multiplicity surfaces in Bergson’s uphold- ing of the existence ofa single, universal and impersonal Time. the water, the gl terrupted murmun things or a single one, neous insofar as my own in another that cont: Bo | ses that occupy | each other in the dura~ t brings us back to internal : | Let us retum to the characteristics by which Bergson il or continuous into elements that us take up another ion has been carried out: and each step of ther). The fact that th condition of actually being carried out means that the parts (luxes) must be lived or at least posited and thought of as capa- Ahas of B "s race as eapaborder to posit the existence of two times, we are forced to introduce a strange factor: the image that A has of B, while nevertheless knowing that B cannot live in this way. This fac- tor is completely “symb excludes the re so-call that ‘opposes and ced experience and through it (and onl ¥econd time realized. From this Bergson conc! ere exists one Time and. ime only, as much on the level of the actual parts as on the level of the vi We shall soon see.) sve follow the division in the other direction, if we go back, we see the fluxes each time with their differences in kind, with ther differences of contraction and expansion (détente), commis nicating in a single and identical Time, which their condition: “A single duration w the events of the tot pick up along its route of the material world; and we wi then be able to elfminate the human consciousness that we had initially had available, every now and then, as so many relays for the movement of our thought: there will now only be imper= sonal time in which all things will flow."!8 Hence the tr ity of fluxes, our duration (the duration of a spectator) being necessary both as flux and as representative of Time in which texts are perfectly reconcilable and contain no contradiction: ‘There is only one time (monism), although there is an infin- ity of actual fluxes (generalized pl ticipate in the same virtual whole (I in no way gives up the idea of a difference in kind between ny more than he gives up the idea of differences f relaxation (détente) or contractio: ity that encompasses them and is actualized in them. But he considers actual flux 2 this single and same Time. - It is nonetheless true that the Bergsonian demonstration of the contradictory character of the plurality of times seems obscure. Let us clarify it at the level of the theory of Re ity. For, paradoxically, only this theory makes it appear clear and convincing. Insofar as we are dealing with qualitatively dis- based on the following hypoth There are no longer qualitative fluxes, of reciprocal and uniform replacement” where the observers are interchangeable, no longer a privileged sys- tem.” Let us accept this hypothesis. Einstein says that the time of the two systems, Sand S’, is not the same. But what is this it is not that of Peter in S, nor that of Paul in S', is these two times only differ quant systems, “in a state e there difference is cancelled out when one takes § and S! as systems of reference in turn. Could it at least be said that this is the one that Peter conceives as lived or capable ived by Paul? Not at all ~ ond this isthe essential point of the Bergsonian argument. “Undoubtedly Peter sticks a label on other tim jon and measuring see Paul take his own system as a system of ce, and then place himself in this single Time, internal to each system, which we ha er, also for this 83render his system of reference and in cons ing simply that such a sys- is taken as a reference point. “Peter no longer envisages Pi hor even a conscious being, nor even a being: he empties from terior the visual image of Paul, only retaining the exter- nal envelope of the charact: Thus, in the Relativity hypothesis, it becomes obvious that there can only be a single livable and lived time. (This dem- ‘onstration goes beyond the relativist hypothesis, since qual tative differences, in their turn, cannot constitute numerical distinctions.) This is why Bergson claims that Relativity in fact demonstrates the opposite of what it asserts about the plurality of time.2! All Bergson’s other criticisms derive from this. For ‘what simultaneity does Einstein have in mind when he states that it varies from one system to the other? A simultaneity «defined by the readings of two distant clocks. And it is true that this simultaneity is variable or relative. But precisely because its relativity expresses, not something lived or li but the symbolic factor of which we have just been speal In this sense, this simultaneity presupposes two others in the imultaneities that are not variable but absolute: n two instants, taken from external ‘movements (a nearby phenomenon and a moment of the clock), and the simultan tants with the instants taken by them from our duration, And these two simultaneities pre- suppose yet another, that of the fluxes, which is even less conscious and y of these 84 thus tends to ence of variable. m the c 1e Bergsonian theory of simultaneit ye virtual coe time. \ception of duration as the In short, from thi t page of Duration and Simultanety to for having confused the vir- the last, Bergson criticizes E tual and the actual (th that is, of a or multiple?” we find a completely Dura tion is a multiplicity, but of what type? Only the hypothesis of a single Time can, according to Bergson, account for the nature lous achievement it represents for science. (Spatialization has never been pushed so far or in such a way.) But this achieve- ment is that of a symbol for expressing composites, not that of something experienced that is capable, as Proust would say, tle time in the pure state.” Being, or Tim - But it is precisely not “ of expressing. is a muluplc ormity with its typ ‘multiple”; it is One, in icity. When Bergson defends the uniqueness of time, he does not retract anything he has said previously about the virtual ¢ n (détente) and contraction laxati istence of various degrees of | the diflerence in kind between fluxes or actual rhythms. sn he says that space and time never overlap nor “inter- the maintains that only th twine,” inction is real,25 85he does not retract any consisted in of Matter and Memory, of space into dura- order to find in duration a sufficient reason (raison suffisante) of extens the w tion, n. What he condemns from t e start is le combination of space and time into a ba composite, where space is con equence, as a fourth cred as ready made, and time, nsion of space.26 And this, y is characterized by its having pushed this spatial- vation forward, welding the composite together in a completely ind, the «any real to subsist. In short, Relativity has formed an especially close= knit mixture, but a mixture that is part of the Bergsonian cri- tique of the “composite” in gener On the other hand, from Bergson’s point of view we can (in fact we must) conceive of combinations that depend on a completely different prin us consider the degrees of jon (détente) and of contraction, all of which coexist with ‘one another: At the limit of expansion (detente), we have mat- ter27 Whi already ‘one must have di appeared when the other appears. What these moments lose iprocal penetration they respective spreading. hhat they lose in tension they gain in extension, So that, at each moment, everything tends to be spread out into an instan- 86 icker or shiver that con- -nt to push this move- order to obtain space (but space would then be found at the end of the line of dif entiation as the extreme ending that is no longer combined ith duration). Space, in effect, but the “schema” of matter, that is, the representation of the imit where the movement of expansion (detente) would come to an end as the external envelope of all possible extensions. is not matter, i the very opposite.29)As 1g Instant, in a stantly begins again.2# It would be s not matter or extension, In this sense, it is not extensity, that i sand ways of becoming expand must also say that there are all related, but still qui ing only in our own schema of space. The essential point isto see how expansion (détente) and con- traction are relative, and relative to one another. What is 4 (détendu) if not the contracted — and what is con- not the extended, the expanded (détente)? This is why tract in our duration, and always duration in matter. ns of vibrations oF there is always extens When we perceive, we contract m ‘ones are of are not: All our sensations are extensive, all are ‘voluminous” and extended, although to varying degrees and ifferent styles, depending on the type of contraction that ey carry out. And qualities belong to matter as much as to = They belong to matter, they are in matte frtue 87of the vibrations an« bers that punctuate t since they ar m intern: ¥y are insepar from the contractions that become expanded (détendu) in ther and matter is never expanded (detendu) enough to stop having this minimum which itis part of duration. never contracted enough to be inde- pendent of the internal matter where it operates, and of the it comes to contract. Let us return to the image werted cone: Its point (our present) represents the most contracted point of our duration; but it also represents our ion in the least contracted, that is, (détenda) matter. Thi to Bergson, intelligence has two correlative aspects, forming an ambiguity tot it marks our adapta- ‘on matter; but it only does so by means of mind or duration, by placing itself in ms Point of tension that allows it to master matter) Ini ‘one must therefore distinguish between form and sense: an in is why, accor essen s aq tion to matter, it molds i most expanded (d ‘most contracted, throu iu), but it has and finds its sense in the es mat- at its form separates in gence from its meaning, but that this meaning always r inal analysis, Bergson refuses all simple genesis, ld account for intel presupposed of matter, or which would account for t phenomena of matter on the basis of the supposed categories ous genesis of for the \ce on the basis of an nce. There be a simultan ance. One step for one, one ste 88 nce is contracted in matter at the same time yn; both find the jum, in extensity, other: Int as matter is expanded (détendu) form that is common to them, their equi igence in its tum pushes this form to a degree of (décente) that matter and extensity would never have attained by themselves — that of a pure space.” rat 89Carrer V Elan Vital as Movement of Differentiation Our problem is now this: By moving from dualism to monism, ca of differences in kind to that of levels of expan- sion (détente) and contraction, is Bergson not reintroducing into his philosophy everything that he had condemned ~ the dif: ferences in degree and intensity that he so strongly criticized in Time and Free Wil? Bergson says in turn that the past and the present differ in kind and that the present is only the most contracted level or degree of the past: How can these two propositions be reconciled? The problem is no longer that of monism; we have seen how the coexisting degrees of expan- sion (détente) and contraction effectively implied a single time in which even the “fluxes” were simultaneous. The problem is that of the harmony between the dualism of differences in kind and the monism of degrees of expansion (détente), between the two moments of the method or the two “beyonds” the turn in experience ~ recognizing that the moment of dualism has not been suppressed at all; but completely retai The critique of intensity in Time and Free Will is hi ambiguous. Is it directed against the very notion of intensive ‘quantity, or merely against the idea of an intensity of psychic from th ts sense.stat is true that intensity is never gi rience, is it not then intensity that giv which we make experienc: 4 pure expe- the qual nizes intensities, degrees or vibrations in the qualities that we urselves and that, as such, belong to re are numbers i luded in duration. Here again, must we speak of a contra- diction in Bergsor the method, wi eas such ou (1) Bergson begins by criticizing any vision of the wor based on differences in degree or inte sight of the essential point; that is, the articulations of the réal or the qualitative differences, the differences in kind. There is adifference in kind between space and duration, matter and memory, present and past, etc. We o1 “These in fact lose discover this differ- cence by dint of decomposing the composites given in experi- ence and going beyond the “tun.” We discover the differences in kind between two actual tendencies, between two actual rections toward the pure state into which each composite This is the moment of pure dualism, or of the divi- sion of composites. (2) But we can already see that itis not enough to say that ference in kind is between two tendencies, between two rections, between space and duration. ... For one of these two directions takes all the differences in kind on its all the differences in degree relation to itself. It is space that only presents difference "eto the point where it appears as the schema of an 92 id between two tendencies, but a difference between the differences in kind that correspon dency. the moment of neutralizes (3) Duration, , and for itself; and space or matter is difference in degree out- tself and for us. Therefore, between the two there are al the degrees of difference or, in other words, the whole nature of difference. Duration is only the most contracted degree of mat= ter, matter the most expanded (dééendu) degree of duration. But duration is like a naturing nature (nature naturante), and mat- ter a natured nature (nature naturée). Differences in degree are the lowest degree of Difference; differences in kind (nature) are the highest nature of Difference. There is no longer any dual- ism between nature and degrees. All the degrees coexist in a con the one hand, in differences in differences in degree. This is the im: All the degrees coexist in a single Time, itself.2 There is no contradiction between this monism and dualism, as moments of the method. For the between actual tendencies, between actual unity occurs at a second turn: The coexistence o the of all the levels is virtu virtual. The point of tself virtual. This poi ty to the One-Whole of the Platonists. is not without similar- the levels of expan- gle Time and form pure virtuality. This potentially 3we are able to rediscover dualism and account for it on a new plane. A fourth moment must be added jes — that of dualism recovered, mas tered and in a sense, generated. What does Bergson mean when he talks about lan vital? is always a case of a virtuality in the process of being actual- ized, a simplicity in the process of in the process of s or actual- the very movement matter, according ‘We then encounter a problem that is peculiar to Bergsonism: There are two types of division that must not be confused. t type, we begin with a composite, for ime mixture or the perception-image example and recollection-image mixture. We divide t two actual we extend ure dura 1 are speaking of a completely yond the turn in experience (pure matter and jon, or else pure present andtypes of division coincide and are superimpos respond closely to each other. In the second type of division we rediscover differences in kind identical or analogous to those that had been determined in th ion of the world is « type. In both cases ized for only taking account of differences in degree where, more profoundly, there are dif. ferences in kind.? In both cases a dualism is established between tendencies that differ in kind. But this is not the same state of dualism, and no¢ the same division. In the first type a reflexive dualism, which results from the decomposition of an ‘impure composite: It constitutes the first moment of the method In the second type it is a genetic dualism, the result of the dif {ferentiation of a Simple or a Pure: It Forms the final moment of the method that ultimately rediscovers the starting point on this new plane. + What is the nature of this one and simple Virtual? How is it that, as early a5 Time and Free Will, then in Matter and Memory, Bergson’s philosophy should have attributed such importance to the idea of virtuality at the very moment when it was challenging the category of possi- bility? It is because the “virtual” can be distinguished from the “possible” from at least two points of view. From a certain point of view, in fact, the possible is the opposite of the real, in quite a different opposition, ‘opposed to the actual. We must take this ten nology seriously: The possible has no reality (although it may ‘One question becomes press such possesses a reali re states of virtual c ideal with- out being abstract. of view, the pos another point (orisnot real- t to two essen- imitation. For tial rules, one of resemblance and the real is supposed to be in the image cept, there is no difference between the possible and the real |, realization involves a | tation by which some possibles are supposed to be re cor thwarted, while others “pass” into the real. The virtual, on the other hand, does not have to be realized, but rather actu- and the rules of actualization are not those of resem- vergence xl of creation. When certain biologists invoke a notion of organic virtuality or potentiality and nonetheless maintain that this potent And, every possibl the possible.¥ For, in ord wed, the virtual can- not proceed by elimination or limitation, but must create its positive acts. The reason for this ness of the between the virtual from which we begin and the actuals at » the difference between the comple- ; the charact at it is actualized 1es Bergson challenge the notion of the possibl ”favor of that of the virtual? It is precisely = by virtue of these preceding characteristics — the possible is a false notion, the source of © problems. The real is supposed to resemble it. That is to say, we give ourselves a real that is ready- made, preformed, pre-existent to itself, and that will pass into ig to an order of successive limitations, Everything is already completely given: all of the real in the If the real is said to resemble the possible, is this not in fact because the real was expected to tious image of it, and to claim that it was possible at any time, before it happened? In fact, it is not the real that resembles the possible, it is the possible that resembles the real, because it has been abstracted from the real once made, arbitrarily extracted from the real like a sterile double.? Hence, we no longer understand any 1er of the mechanism of differ ence or of the mechanism of creation. Evolution takes place from the virtual to actuals. Evolution tion is creation. When we speak of ion we must therefore avoid two mis- conceptions: that of interpreting it in terms of the “possible that is realized, or else interpreting it in terms of pure actu- als. The first misconception obviously appears in preformism, And, contrary to preformism, evolutionism have the merit of reminding us that life is production, creation of differences. The whole problem is that of the nature and the tal can certainly be conceived of as purely accidental. But three obj a Wn of this kind ari 98 ever small they are, would remain exter cach other: (2) since they are external, they could into anything but relations of association and addition with one another (3) since they are indifferent, they could not even have the enter into such relations (for there would be no reason why the small successive variations should link up and add together sudden and simultaneous vari livable whole).10 If we invoke the action of the environment and the influ- ence of external conditions, the three objections persist in another form: For the differences are still perspective of a purely external causality. In their nature they ‘would only be passive effects, elements that could be abstractly combined or added together. In their relationships they would, however, be incapable of functioning “as a bloc,” so as to con- trol or utilize their causes. The mistake of evolutionism is, thus, to conceive of variations as so many actual determinations that should then combine on a single line. The three requirements of a philoso- phy of life are as follows: ference can only be experienced and thought is only in this sense that the “ten- deney to change” is not accidental, and that the variations means to re the same direction; nor any reason for ns to be coordinated into a iterpreted from the al «dan internal cause in that tendency; themselve: (2) these vari ciation and addition, but on the contrary, they enter into rela- tionships of dissociation or division; (3) they therefore involve a virtuality that is actualized ns do not enter into relationships of asso- 99according to the lines of divergence; so that ev does not ‘move from one actual term to another actual term in a homo- geneous unilinear series, but from a virtual term to the het- ‘erogencous terms that actu: along a rami But this leads to the question of how the Simple or the One, “the original has the power to be The answer is already contained in Matter and Memory. And the kage between Creative Evolution and Matter and Memory is per- ly rigorous. We know that the virtual as virtual has a reality; s reality, extended to the whole universe, consists in all the coexisting degrees of expansion (détente) and contraction. A gigantic memory, a universal cone in which everything coex- ists with itself, except for the differences of level. On each of these levels there are some “outstanding points," which are hey are the realty ofthis vireual. This was the sense of the theory of virtual mul 's that inspired Bergsonism from the start. When the ated, is “developed,” when it actualizes and develops its parts, it does so according to lines that are divergent, but each of which corresponds to a particular degree in the virtual total- ‘There is here no longer any coexisting whole; there are but each representing an actualization of the whole in one direction and not combining with other lines or other tions. Nevertheless, each of these egrees that all coexist in the le separating it from the othe rec es corresponds to one of tual: 5 it embodies its prominent points, while being unaware of everything that hap- then life into plant Is of contraction, which only coex- to various instinets, or when ded according to species actualization correspond to the levels or the virtual degrees of expansion (détente) or contraction, it should not be thought that the lines of actualization confine themselves to tracing these levels or degrees, to reproducing them by simple resem- blance. For what coexisted in the virtual ceases to coexist in the actual and is distributed in lines or parts that cannot be summed up, each one retaining the whole, except from a cer- tain perspective, from a certain point of view. These lines of differentiation are therefore truly cre yey only actu- lize by inventing, they create in these conditions the physi- ital or psychical representative of the ontological level hat they embody. If we concentrate only on the actuals that conclude each +, we establish ips between them — whether of gradation or opposition. Between plant and anim between animal and man, we now only see ituate a fundamental opposition in each see in one the negative of the other, the for exam- her. Bergson often expresses himself in this w: contrariety: Matter is presented as the obstacle tal must‘Summary Diagram of Differentiation (CE, Ch. 2) The diferent wos, and in each wrt, the types of mater that ppearas the many externa ag itrral obstacles that ie mustavo. J Matter ‘eanabo/expansion atten 7. ‘fasensbetan (accumulation of energy ‘na coniaucus ashion, Pant chorophyous ncton storing up enplasives). \ ratte 7 tonto nonin lite tin of mater Exerinzation and domi system; Instinct Cette spon, /” Decentralized nervous Y \ (expenditure cfeneceyin ‘discontinuous way, etonation ofthe ‘ima: ervous sytem close, wor \. conerionand tert Inetigeee. ingot tuto). It should not, however, be thought that Bergson is going back to a conception of the negative that he had previously condemned, any more than he returns to a the- ory of deteriorations. For one only has to replace the actual terms in the movement that produces them to bring them back to the order to see that dif ferentiation is never a negation but a creation, and that differ- cence is never negative but essentially positive and creative. ality actualized in them, We always rediscover the laws common to these lines of actu- alization or of differentiation. There is a correlation between fe and matter, between expansion (détente) and contraction, which shows the coexistence of their respective degrees in the virtual Whole, and their essential relativity in the process of actualization. Each line of life is related to a type of matter that is not merely an external environment, but in terms of which the living being manufactures a body, a form, for itself This is why the living being, in relation to matter, appears pri- marily as the stating of a problem, and the capacity to solve problems: The construction of an eye, for example, is primarily the solution to a problem posed in terms 0 time, we will say that the solution was as good as it could have been, given the way in which the problem was stated, and the ‘means that the living being had at its disposal to solve it. (It we compare a similar instinct in various species, we ought not to say that it is more or less complete, fected, but that itis as perfect as it can be in nevertheless clear that each vital solu- a success: By dividing the animal in two, Arthropods and Vertebrates, we have not taken into account is im this way that 103the two other d lusks, which are a setback lems for them= the problem or the environment, itis sti on to the movement that inve by being acted out. It cannot assemble its actual Parts that remain external to each other: The Whole is never ‘given.” And, in the ac as many worlds as e confusion of space and time, the assim lation of time into space, make us think that the whole is gi ceven if only in principle, even if only in the eyes of God. And rminable in terms ofa program: In any event, time is only there now as a screen that hides the eternal from us, or that shows us successively what a God or a superhurna e glance.” Now this spa sion supplementary to those where a phenomenon happens for the movement in the course of happenit 0 appear to us as a 04 form. If we consider time as a fourth dimension ce, this fourth dimension will thus be assumed to con- and move- Je forms of the universe as a whol ment in space, as well as flowing in time, will now only be appearances linked to the three dimensions.2 But the fact that real space has only three dimensions, that Time is not a dim of space, really means this: There is an efficacity, a po tivity of time, that is ider “hesitation” of things a in this way, to creation in the world. actualized accor ing to divergent lines; but these ir own account, and do not fFthe choice is between mecha- es providing that itis cor rected in to ways. On the one hand, it is right to compare the ving being to the whole of the universe, but it is wrong to interpret this comparison as if it expressed a kind of analogy between two closed totalities (macrocosm and microcosm). The finality of the living being exists only insofar as itis essen- ly open onto a totality that is itself open y nal, or it is nothing at all.”22 It is thus the whole classical ‘comparison that takes on another meaning; it is not the whole that closes like an organism, it is the organism that opens onto a whole, like this virtual whole. ‘On the other hand, there is a proof of finality to the extent resemble what they actu ti apparatuses on divergent the eye in the Mol- isk and in the Vertebrate). The example v the more 1 means.?? We see here very catey in the process of actualization, 1 of resem 1051e movements of produ each other, nor do the produ they embody. This is why actualizat 1s do not pre-exist eae and are them- ‘along with” the act that runs through them.2 1e of actual each time, it must invent the figure of create the means forthe development ofthat which was only enveloped in order to disti principle con- ” means virtu- Bergson’s answe: lan vital succe: rediscover of expansion (détente) and Whole. As if he were ight about in himself suc- 1 elsewhere, can only be em! 106 in different species. Evei prepares matter. And durat him are still internal to him. Man thers for the Whole, and he alone traces out an open direc pen. Whereas the other in circles, whereas a dist beyond his own plane as his own condi express naturing Nature.27 How does this privilege of man come about? At first sight, isa humble one. Every contraction of duration matter, the point of departure i bral matter. We recall that this latter “analyzed” the received ted the reaction, made possible an interval jothing here goes beyond excitation, se between excitation and react that descends le of fre actualized. On man’s line of dif entiation, the élan vital was able to use matter to create an make a machin! minism had spread.”28 Freedom has precisel detonate” an explosiion is conventional and can border on thing that is grounded is the obligation requirement of natur inakind on a counterpart that nature pro- duces in the reasonable being in order to compensate for the of his int 1 one produces an the other, an equivalent of inst sence, nothing yet he forms are no less |. Moreover, of the mind, and swe were able with a leap to place ourselves in the pure past. We now find ourselves before another intercer itelligence that it srefore seem to be constantly appears in the interval hat appears in the intervalifferentiation, that inct, nevertheless anything of importance, ids itself complet closed society as such, through the Bergson’s real answer is complet hat appears in In this answer, “We have no choice. ature from both lual egoism and quasi- instinctive social pressure. Obviously no one denies that ego- ism produces emotions; and even more so social pressure, with all the fantasies of the story-telling function. But in bot hese ing that it is I generating does not have, an object, but merely an esence that spreads itself over various objects, ani- ‘mals, plants and the whole of nature. “Imagine a which expres ve will depend upon its essence and not upon "5 Although le of creation, then because it creates the work in which is expressed: and fi ly, because it communi (ors or hearers). ines a varial fow, by means of this interval is produced or embodied: creative emotion. This longer has anything to do with the pressures of society, nor the disputes of the individ to do with an individual who contests or even invents, nor with a society that constrains, that persuades or even tells stories. 5 the circular play of excitation ions in images. And what is Fnot precisely a cosmic Memory, that the levels at the same time, that liberates man from the plane (plan) or the level that is proper to him, in order to make him a creator, adequate to the whole movement of creation? This liberation, this embodi memory in creative emotions, undoubtedly only takes place in privi- leged souls. It leaps from one soul to another, “every now and "crossing closed deserts. But to each member of a closed he opens himself to it, it communicates a kind of nce, an excitement that allows him to follow. And traces the design of an open society, aso one genius t0 a or spectators or hearerintuition, this emotion. Thus the great souls ~ toa g philosophers — are those of artists and mystics (at least those it is the my invents an expression of dynamism, Servant of an open and finite God (such are the who plays wit whose jonship between the Jamental concepts of Duration, Memory and the Flan fers im noture). Memory then appears as the es of differentiation to this precise line of man consciousness.AFTERWORD A Return to Bergson A “return to Bergson” does not only mean a renewed admira- tion for a great philosopher but a renewal or an extension of his in relation to the transformations of life and soci- th the transformations of science. Bergson him- tt he had made metaphysics a rigorous pline, one capable of being continued along new paths which constantly appear in the world. It seems to us that the return to Bergson, understood in this way, rests on three main features. Intuition Bergson saw int to the ineffable, a par- n, but as a true rongly posed questions, and to discover the variables uch. The means used ina given d yn the other hat and which converge. It is this complex us'0 convergences, WI leads to the proper posing of a problem, in such a ion itself depends on it. Science and Metaphysics science and metaphys- ‘0 two paths in a single impe- just as physics related movement to pri moments, metaphysics con from which these positions ‘on the contrary, when movement is related to “a ud Simulta- ity. This book Jed to so much mis was thought that Bergson was seeking to refute or correct Einstein, while in fact hhe wanted, by means of the new feature of duration, to give the terpiece, Motterand Memon, Bergson dravv ception of the brain to which he hi important metaphysic of mem- Bergson's project today, means for example to constitute a meta- correspond 1, open covered by a molecular biology kings in thought. a type of multiplicity. This isa strange wo iakes the multiple no longer an adjective but a ‘Thus, he exposes the traditional theme of the one a ‘o-mathematical (deriving from Riemani 10 believe that Bergson was not aware of the scien- origin of the Bergson moves toward a of mul Once again, Bergson intends to give es the metaphysics which their scientific treatment . This is pethaps one of the least appreciated aspects fo rediscover Bergson is to follow in these three directions. It should be noted that these three in phenomenology ~ i “7‘explorations of space-times in ps le a whole pathology of duration. In an outstanding art cle on “paramnesia” (false recognition), Bergson invokes meta- to show how a memory n, but is strictly c ves, Bergsonism is not constituted after present emporaneous with les into two simultaneous tenden- percep each instant duration d cies, one of w! goes toward the future and the other fal back into the past. He also invokes psychology, in order to then show how a failure of adaptation can make memory invest the present as such. Scientific hypothesis and metaphysical thesis are constantly combined in Bergson in the reconstitution of complete experience. Gites Deveuze Translated by Hugh Tomlinson Notes TRANSLATORS! INTRODUCTION 1. Bergson, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985, p. 2 2, Sce Gilles Deleuze and Clare Parnet, Dialogues (translated by Hugh Tom: inson and Barbara Habberjam). London: The Athlone Press 1987, pp. M415. 16 4 Michel Cressole," in Michel Cressole, Delewre. Pats: 3 Universitaires, 1973, p. 4. Dialogues op. 5. Ibid, ppv 6 1984, Chapter. 1. Gilles Deleuze, Cinema 1: The Movement-Imoge translated by Hugh r es 1986, Chap- fime-Image (translated by ndon: The Athlone Press, 1988, Chap 8. Time and Free Wil, Meter and Memory, Creative Erolution, and Mind-Energy see Gilles Deleuze, Kanes Critical Barbara Habberjaet Paoles,Vol. 3 p. 456) reo" of CM, 75 a greater biological 10 mm ing beings are w the degree 0 on of all those parts oftotheir space’ 31. CM, 38-39((1275, 32. CB, Insofar ipites in the whole of the universe. The meaning of restriction will become clearer in Chapter 4. 33.cM, 7, 206-208), 34. CM, 65-71 (129-430, 58-64). 37.CF.CM, 42-43, ‘touches one of another: 38. CM, 68 (1300, 61). Cuarrer U1 1. See A. Robinet’s excel 1965, pp. 284, 2. Admittedly, as early as Time and Free Will Bergson points out the prob nt, in Bergson, Seghers, lem ofa ge sity ef. 95-97 (64465, 7 the concept of space, stating from a perception of exten= read defined by the parts that are act TF, 84-85 (57, 63). This implies t 23contains more: MM, 147 (289, 164) ‘out che real according to aticl 7): “There is han that philosophy should at frst have been content (CE, 3210 (7571, 3101.) “But all move- haere is more in the object than in percep- nothing that is of a different kind, But in this case, the that of matter or ofthe perceived object, thus a present being 8). sus a profound analy 1949; and “Aspects divers de la chez Bergson," Reru intemaionae de philosophic, October, 1949. 34 (276-277, 48). once” (dembl) is requenty wed in Chapters and the formation of rec contemporancous with Je moment as per: The more we reflect, theison could also be made here between Bergson and Proust. conception of time 17. The metaphor ofthe cone is fist introduced in M1 18, MM, 241-242 (371, 272) 19. On this metaphysical repetition ef. MM, 103-104 (250, 1 152 (293, he pyramid toward the base. rom the cone and denotes a compl ‘Translation modified Cf, MM, 92.95 (238-240, 100-102); 98 (243-244, 10: MM, 98 (244, 107). Th ‘one automatic, the other atentive, to which comespond two forms of memory.40. ME, 130 (896, 107) Cuarrer IV. Le CEabove pp. 27-28. tions strung out along the course of their mascent oF possible action in space. here a continuous movement (292, 168). 4. On going beyond the ended, cf, MM, Chs. Land 4, rement belonging to things as much as to the Self, ef, MM, 104 (340, 230). 18 rents permeate one another side by side, and consequently duction ofthe theme tion: Ch. CE, 99-100 (57 se texts are nevertheless related to those where Bergson challenges notion of the negative tions, 201 (337, 226); on irre Jucible rhythms, 205-206 (342, 232-233); on the absolute character of dif- |The next two quotations come from t very important to Bergson’s whole philosophy. 10. C£.CE, 184 (637, 168 they have been cut out by my senses and understanding progresses in the same manner as a consciousness?" On the particular characteristic of the living being, an ts resemblance to the Whole, (S07, 15). Bur Matter and Memary had areal invoked the Whole and a duration to 45-46 (57-58), 13. DS, 46 (58-59). Bergson goes so far as to say that impersonal Time has we personal character of durations t homogencous and impersonal duration, {s no contradiction: In 129in. But Bergson’ reasoning Bergson does not confine himself to saying: A time that is different from mine is not lived, either by me or by ‘of others (and reciprocally). For Bergson fully admits the legitimacy of such an image in expressing the tensions and the relations between durations that he will constantly something eom- of others, or that Peter naght as or by Petr as he imagines anda moment of fluxes, DS, 52-53 heme of simul 28, CE, 221-222 (666-667, 203-204) and MM, Ch. 4 passin. 29, On space as scheme or schema, ef MM, 206 (341, 232}: (MR: On naturing Nature 19 (1024, 56). The apparently strange notion of nature’8 (549-554, 64-70). 11. CE, 80 (555, 72): example, hi the eighteenth century: fact thatthe divergences: ke consciousness, exactly se points correspond tothe at each level ofthe cone. Each line tion thus constcutes a “plane (plan) of nature” own way virtual section or level (ef: note 2, above). vocabulary, ef CE, Ch 3 negati of need. *sssat each ‘combination, perfect of its kind.” 17. CE, 145 (606, 132). passes, the living turn upon themselves, borme They are therefore relatively stable and counter than the other animal species: 1006, 34); 245-24 might be said that he is 193, 273). and of the 3325. CE. CE, 198-199 (649, 182) ME, 8 (318M, 26. MR, 200 (1154, 223) 27. On the man who tricks nature, extending beyond th returning toa na _poing beyond his own 153, 222), ‘explanation in certain texts, for exam- painful. On the cres jon, the reader is referred to the in, pp. 76 192, 270) and 30-32 (1007. bbe noted that BsIndex 55-56, 61,6263, 76-77, 84, 85; diminution of, 23 paradox of, 6; -present. 55; pure, 59. Concept 28, 44~45, 75, Cone, mexaphor of, $960 (cal and psycholog jeal, 65: 3 38 Extension, 22, 34, 35.42.7475, 79, 86, 87-88, 89, 94. Exterior 49, 6-15, 77-78, 93,99, T1782, 86 87-09,92-93.98, 101-03, 107-08 contraction ofMuhiples the, 38,4344, 45~ 47,16, 80,85, 98s unity of, 44,45, 76,79, 82,87-89,95: levels, Rovation, 64, 65 66,68, 68, 70: 6. Recognition, 67,68, 69. Recollection, 21-27, 30, 312,48, 73, 81-82, 83, 33,40, 42-43, 32,43, 58-59, 61-62, 74,75, 78, 79H, 85-86,93,, 104-05; mukiplcty of 142