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Bergson’s philosophy is dualistic—the world contains two opposing tendencies—the life force (élan vital) and the resistance of the material world against that force. Human beings know matter through their intellect, with which they measure the world. They formulate the doctrines of science and see things as entities set out as separate units within space. In contrast with intellect is intuition, which derives from the instinct of lower animals. Intuition gives us an intimation of the life force which pervades all becoming. Intuition perceives the reality of time—that it is duration directed in terms of life and not divisible or measurable. Duration is demonstrated by the phenomena of memory. From The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. Copyright © 2003 Columbia University Press.Reading
Time and Free Will (1889),
Matter and Memory (1896),
Laughter (1901),
Introduction to Metaphysics (1903),
Creative Evolution (1907),
The Two Sources of Morality and Religion (1932),
The Creative Mind (1934).
Writing available on the net
Laughter - An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic
Commentaries
See H. W. Carr, The Philosophy of Change (1914, repr. 1970); H. M. Kallen, William James and Henri Bergson (1914); P. A. Y. Gunter, Bergson and the Evolution of Physics (1969); L. Kolakowski, Bergson (1985); G. Deleuze, Bergsonism (tr. 1988).