Thursday, June 22, 2017

Time, Duration, Repetition

The primary topic of the exchange between Bergson and Einstein is 'Time', with the former arguing that what the latter calls "time" is actually Spatialized Duration, and the latter responding that Duration is a merely "psychological" experience that is irrelevant to the objective feature that Physicists study.  Bergson thus misses a cue from Kant, who shows that inner experience is constituted by not merely empirical psychological data, but also cognitive structures that ground both the perception of 'objective' "time", and its quantification.  Similarly, Bergson could easily assert that the essence of Physicist Time is Repetition, i. e. the basis of Quantification, and that Repetition entails both intra- and inter-cycle continuity, or, in other words, Duration. Put otherwise, Repetition is Duration that has been subsequently subdivided.  For example, the motion of Einstein's orbiting Moon, is, in itself, continuous, becoming enumerable only by the introduction of some extrinsic reference point by means of which the motion can be subdivided into cycles. Likewise, all Quantification involves overlaying a substratum of Duration with recurring homogeneous units. Bergson thereby could follow Kant by making the stronger argument that Einstein's concept presupposes his, which avoids the impasse of two question-begging positions that constitute the actual exchange.

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