In An Introduction to Metaphysics (1913) - don't be fooled, it is not an introduction to metaphysics at all - Bergson uses his concept of duration to distinguish between two ways of knowing: that of the sciences, and metaphysics. For Bergson, life exists in duration, which means it is ultimately ever-changing - you can never experience the same thing twice, because the second time around your memory of the first experience will color the second iteration of this phenomenon; the experience has changed as a result of your existence in 'duration.' Knowing in the sciences means arresting duration, creating a fixed point of view (understanding), or taking a still snapshot of life. Knowing in metaphysics means engaging in intellectual sympathy with the object of inquiry, or achieving an interior understanding (being with the object in its ever-changing duration) through intuition.Metaphysics, then, is the science which claims to dispense with symbols.Henri Bergson
Although it sounds a bit like mysticism at first, he gives us this initial example:
There is one reality, at least, which we all seize from within, by intuition and not by simple analysis. It is our own personality in its flowing through time - our self which endures. We may sympathize intellectually with nothing else, but we certainly sympathize with our own selves.
Throughout this book we're confronted with the paradox of trying to understand duration. As soon as we attempt to know it, we turn it into a concept - which is yet another, false, image of the thing itself (a scientific, symbolic way of knowing). But this initial example is a potent one, if we are trying to come to terms with Bergson's concept of duration, which influenced Deleuze a great deal (especially in his work on cinema). Perhaps our own existence in duration is a fitting place to start for a blog whose aim is to turn theory in on our own lives.
