Living Consciousness : The Metaphysical Vision of Henri Bergson
, by Barnard, G. William
- ISBN: 9781438439570 | 1438439571
- Cover: Hardcover
- Copyright: 12/1/2011
Explores the thought of Henri Bergson, highlighting his compelling theories on the nature of consciousness and its relationship to the physical world.
G. William Barnard is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Southern Methodist University. He is the author of Exploring Unseen Worlds: William James and the Philosophy of Mysticism, also published by SUNY Press, and coeditor (with Jeffrey J. Kripal) of Crossing. Boundaries: Essays on the Ethical Status of Mysticism.
| Acknowledgments | p. x |
| Abbreviations | p. xiii |
| A Brief Bio-Historical Preamble | p. xv |
| Introduction | p. xxiii |
| Explorations of consciousness, authenticity, time, and freedom | |
| The nature of consciousness | p. 3 |
| Questioning and Experiencing Consciousness | p. 3 |
| Enduring Duree | p. 6 |
| Struggling with Immediacy | p. 7 |
| Carving Up the World | p. 10 |
| An "Object"-tive Understanding of Ourselves | p. 12 |
| Language and Durée | p. 13 |
| The Paradox of Durée | p. 14 |
| Authenticity | p. 18 |
| The Superficial Self and the Deep Self | p. 18 |
| Rumination: Authentic Selfhood | p. 21 |
| Time | p. 28 |
| Duree as Time | p. 28 |
| Rumination: Consciousness as Time | p. 30 |
| Quantity and Quality | p. 33 |
| Do Our Feelings Measure Up? | p. 33 |
| Determinism | p. 38 |
| Physical Determinism | p. 38 |
| A Historical Interlude: Predeterminism | p. 40 |
| Psychological Determinism | p. 44 |
| Alternative Understandings Of The Self | p. 46 |
| Associationist Ideas of the Self | p. 46 |
| A Substantially Flowing Self | p. 41 |
| Freedom | p. 51 |
| Duree: Ever-New | p. 51 |
| Arguing for Free Will | p. 54 |
| Freedom: An Immediate Fact | p. 57 |
| A Little Hard-Core Common Sense | p. 59 |
| Degrees of Freedom | p. 61 |
| Liminal Section: The Dynamism of Matter | |
| The world "out there" | p. 71 |
| Playing with the Space In-Between | p. 71 |
| Splitting Up the World | p. 72 |
| Movement | p. 73 |
| Motion as a Whole | p. 73 |
| Moving from One Point to Another | p. 14 |
| Catching Up with Zeno | p. 16 |
| An Atomistic Understanding of Reality | p. 78 |
| Unchanging Atoms or Universal Flux? | p. 78 |
| Mini-Rumination: Porous Bodies | p. 79 |
| Going Beyond Classical Physics | p. 82 |
| Beyond Mechanism | p. 82 |
| Contra Atomism | p. 83 |
| Bergson Said It First | p. 84 |
| Melodies of the Self and the World | p. 88 |
| Matter as Melody | p. 88 |
| A Flowing Identity | p. 92 |
| Rumination: The "Both/And" Perspective of Bergson | p. 95 |
| The Matter of consciousness and the consciousness of matter | |
| contemporary understandings of consciousness | p. 105 |
| Remembering Matter and Memory | p. 105 |
| Becoming Conscious of Consciousness | p. 106 |
| Theories of Consciousness: Dualism | p. 107 |
| Theories of Consciousness: Epiphenomenalism | p. 108 |
| Theories of Consciousness: Materialism | p. 109 |
| A Problem for Materialism: The Unity of Consciousness | p. 111 |
| An Evolutionary Problem: When Did Consciousness Arise? | p. 113 |
| Contemporary Theorists-Various "Camps" | p. 116 |
| One Solution to the "Hard Problem": Panpsychism | p. 117 |
| Why Is Panpsychism So Often Dismissed or Ignored? | p. 118 |
| Images Of The Universe | p. 121 |
| Making Consciousness Matter | p. 121 |
| Material Images | p. 123 |
| A Conscious Universe | p. 123 |
| The Creation of Perceptions | p. 125 |
| Rumination: Opening Ourselves to the Whole | p. 126 |
| Nonlocality And Bergson's Universe Of Images | p. 130 |
| Bell's Theorem and Nonlocality | p. 130 |
| Nonlocality and the Work of David Bohm | p. 133 |
| Perceptions And The Brain | p. 137 |
| Pure Perceptions | p. 137 |
| Perceptions and the Physical Body | p. 138 |
| Relationships between the Brain and Consciousness | p. 140 |
| Understanding the Relationship between the Brain and Consciousness | p. 141 |
| The Brains Role in Pure Perception | p. 142 |
| The Interaction Of Perception And Memory | p. 145 |
| Pure Perceptions and "Primal" Memory | p. 145 |
| Pure Perceptions and Two Basic Forms of Memory | p. 146 |
| Rumination: Cappadocia, Turkey, 2004 | p. 148 |
| Moving From Perception To Memory | p. 151 |
| The Differences between Memory and Perception | p. 151 |
| Two Types of Memories | p. 152 |
| The Interweaving Of Recollection Memory And Habit Memory | p. 155 |
| The Cone of Memory and the Plane of Perception | p. 155 |
| Planes of Consciousness | p. 156 |
| Complete Perception | p. 159 |
| Ruminations On The Hidden Power Of Memory | p. 162 |
| Rumination, Part One: Psychic Cysts and Distorted Perceptions | p. 162 |
| Rumination, Part Two: Freeing Ourselves, Creating New Worlds | p. 168 |
| The Presence Of The Present | p. 173 |
| The Presence of the Past and the Future of Presence | p. 173 |
| The Character of Our Present, the Presence of Our Character | p. 175 |
| Attending to the Present | p. 175 |
| Mini-Rumination: Living in the Now | p. 177 |
| The Indivisibility of Memory | p. 177 |
| Memory And The Brain | p. 180 |
| Where, Oh Where Are Our Memories Stored? | p. 180 |
| Experimental Attempts to Find Memories in the Brain | p. 181 |
| Philosophical Problems with the Memory Trace Theory | p. 184 |
| Brain Injury and Memory: Bergsons Perspective | p. 187 |
| Brain Injury and Memory: Current Understandings | p. 190 |
| Mind And Matter As Different Rhythms Of Duree | p. 193 |
| The Interweaving of Mind and Matter | p. 193 |
| Quantity and Quality: The Difference Overcome | p. 195 |
| Rhythms of Duree | p. 196 |
| Embodying Memory | p. 199 |
| Coping with Memory | p. 199 |
| Rumination: Getting Dreamy and Going on Automatic | p. 200 |
| Learning Physical Movements | p. 202 |
| Moving Intuitively | p. 205 |
| Rumination: Bodily Intuitions | p. 210 |
| Becoming Conscious Of The Subconscious | p. 216 |
| Consciousness and Unconsciousness | p. 216 |
| Rumination: The Subconscious and Superconsciousness | p. 219 |
| Recollection Memory, Dreams, And The Élan Vital | p. 224 |
| Bergsons Ambivalence Toward Recollection Memory | p. 224 |
| Recollection Memory and Bergsons Theory of Dreams | p. 227 |
| The Creativity of Dreams | p. 229 |
| Time and Dreams | p. 231 |
| Dreams, "Virtual" Memory and the Elan Vital | p. 233 |
| Bergson And Non-Ordinary Experiences | p. 237 |
| Rumination: A Neo-Bergsonian Understanding of | |
| Non-Ordinary Experiences | p. 237 |
| Bergsons Participation in "Psychical Research" | p. 249 |
| "Phantasms of the Living' and Psychical Research" | p. 252 |
| Bergson And The Afterlife | p. 257 |
| Bergson and the Survival of Consciousness after the Death of the Physical Body | p. 257 |
| Rumination: Neo-Bergsonian Glimpses of the Afterlife | p. 259 |
| Some Final Words | p. 269 |
| Notes | p. 273 |
| Bibliography | p. 317 |
| Index | p. 327 |
| Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved. |
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