Document Type : Research Paper
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Abstract
One of the important problems in the history of philosophy is the problem of time. Though many philosophers tackled this problem, in the contemporary period it was undoubtedly Henry Bergson who first treated it seriously, to the extent that his philosophy was known as the philosophy of time. He founded the beginning and ending point of his philosophy based on the intuition of time and, in strict sense of the word, on the intuition of duration. According to the tradition of his dualism, there are two approaches toward time in Bergson's philosophy: metaphysical approach and epistemological approach. With reference to the metaphysical approach, this article seeks to cast some light on the reality of time, although the conceptual description of time seems to be impossible and indeed such an approach contradicts the nature of Bergson's philosophy. This is because by imprisoning time in certain concepts, we may do away with his duration and continuity which constitute the essence of his philosophy.
On the whole, Bergson sought to elaborate two negative and affirmative points concerning time: So far as the former is concerned, time is not an independent concept, and indeed it is identical with place, though differentiated from it. As for the latter, time is a spiritual and psychological matter that Bergson calls duere (duration). In this sense, time is an independent fact; indeed it constitutes the basis and reality of everything
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