| Martin Heidegger and Henri Bergson are both renowned for their concern with understanding time, yet their approaches to time have not been rigorously distinguished. This dissertation examines their challenges to traditional concepts of time in philosophy, reconstructs Heidegger's critique of Bergson, and shows how Bergson's thought breaks more radically with the philosophical tradition than Heidegger admits. First, I examine the early development of Heidegger's thought concerning time, focusing on the encounters leading up to his dismissal of Bergson's philosophy of time in Being and Time and his critique of Bergson's understanding of Aristotle in The Basic Problems of Phenomenology. I then discuss Bergson's Time and Free Will in order to reveal the context and motives for his concept of "pure duration," which is necessary to evaluate Heidegger's claims. I argue that although he is correct that Bergson opposes this concept to that of time as quantitative succession, Heidegger does not provide adequate support for the claim that this concept emerges from an interpretation of Aristotle's definition of time. Furthermore, Heidegger neglects Bergson's efforts in Matter and Memory to redefine time through the integral survival of the past. I argue that, contrary to Heidegger's critique, Bergson goes beyond his early identification of time with the flow of consciousness by arguing for the unconscious existence of recollection. Anticipating important features of Heidegger's own concept of temporality as an "ecstatic-horizonal unity," Bergson also discovers a sense of being that challenges the privilege of presence defining traditional ontology as Heidegger interprets it. A systematic comparison will show that both philosophers conceive time in ways that help future thinkers to surpass metaphysical problems concerning time and explore the significance of time for ethics, politics, and aesthetics. |
