Henri Bergson

French philosopher (1859–1941)

Henri-Louis Bergson (18 October 1859 - 4 January 1941), was a French philosopher.

Henri-Louis Bergson
Bergson in 1927
Born(1859-10-18)18 October 1859
Paris, France
Died4 January 1941(1941-01-04) (aged 81)
Paris, France
Era20th-century philosophy
RegionWestern Philosophy
SchoolContinental philosophy
French Spiritualism
Main interests
Metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language,
philosophy of mathematics
Influences
Influenced

Bergson convinced many thinkers that the processes of immediate experience and intuition are more significant than abstract rationalism and science for understanding reality.

Life change

He was born on the Rue Lamartine in Paris, France. His mother, Katherine Levison, was of English and Irish Jewish descent. His father, the pianist Michał Bergson, was of Polish Jewish descent.

His early childhood was spent mostly in London after his birth. He learned the English language from his mother. He returned to Paris when he was nine years old, and became a naturalized French citizen.[1] He attended the Lycée Fontanes in Paris from 1868 to 1878. There he was given the 1877 prize for school mathematics, for the solution of a mathematical problem. When he was nineteen, he studied at École Normale Supérieure (ENS). He read many philosophy books, especially Herbert Spencer.

He was given the 1927 Nobel Prize in Literature.

In 4 January 1941, Bergson died in occupied Paris from bronchitis.[2]

Books change

  • 1889: Essai sur les données immédiates de la conscience
  • 1896: Matière et mémoire
  • 1900: Le Rire
  • 1907: L'Évolution créatrice
  • 1919: L'Énergie spirituelle
  • 1932: Les Deux sources de la morale et de la religion
  • 1934: La pensée et le mouvant

References change

  1. Henri Bergson Life and works The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
  2. Henri Bergson - Biography Archived 2010-05-27 at the Wayback Machine The European Graduate School

Other websites change