Bergson's Hand: Toward a History of (Non)-Organic Vitalism

Fujita, Hisashi; Lapidus, Roxanne; Kolkman, M.; Vaughan, Michael

doi:10.1353/sub.2007.0042

Cited by 17 publications

(4 citation statements)

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“…Here he proposes a unique explanatory image: the hand which moves through iron filings (Bergson 1944, 105f. ;cf. for the importance of this image, see Fujita 2007). Depending on the energy behind the motion of the hand (its 'impulse' or 'effort'), it comes as far as it does and no further, and forms such and such shapes.…”

Section: Bergson's Concept Of Lifementioning

confidence: 99%

Plessner's Philosophical Anthropology. Perspectives and Prospects

Mul¹

2014

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Section: Bergson's Concept Of Lifementioning

confidence: 99%

Plessner's Philosophical Anthropology. Perspectives and Prospects

Mul¹

2014

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“…There is a temptation in biology to dismiss Bergson's idea of a first impulse as a kind of vitalism, in which the élan vital functions as an influencing force that moves life in certain directions or provides the necessary spark that animates life and in some sense defines what it means to be alive. However, this reading is not quite correct, as life for Bergson is the movement or tendency to push through negative influences by dividing itself in new, creative, and emergent ways (Fujita and Lapidus ). This is largely congruent with the findings of biology.…”

Section: Bergson: Life As Tendencymentioning

confidence: 99%

Life as Emergent Agential Systems: Tendencies Without Teleology in an Open Universe

Peck¹

2013

Zygon

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Life is a relationship among various kinds of agents interacting at different scales in ways that are multifarious, complex, and emergent. Life is always a part of an ecological embedding in communities of interaction, which in turn structure and influence how life evolves. Evolution is essential for understanding life and biodiversity. Henri Bergson's Creative Evolution suggests a way of examining "tendencies" without "teleology." In this paper I reexamine that work in light of recent concepts in evolutionary ecology, and explore how agential aspects of life are essential for understanding how emergence provides a basis for a process-based metaphysics of life. In support of this project, I will explore how the major transitions of life on Earth have proceeded through increasing levels of cooperation among agents (e.g., mitochondria in animal cells forming a mutualistic relationship), which have allowed further emergences and complexity to evolve. This complexity always, however, emerges in the context of ecological relationships and a nonteleological evolutionary process. Yet, while nonteleological, the progression of life thus far on this planet seems to hold the promise of certain tendencies that seem inherent in life itself.

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“…Considerations of biological determination and Darwinian explanations for understanding life and creation have become a dominant discourse over the last century, although the exact history of these perspectives can be hard to trace (Fujita and Lapidus, 2007). This physicalist, mechanistic approach (biological phenomenology), alongside evolutionary theory, put vitalism in the shade.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%