A criticism of Sartre's concept of time
pp. 134-147
in: Michael Kelly (ed), Bergson and phenomenology, Berlin, Springer, 2010Abstrakt
Critiques of Sartre's concept of temporality developed in sections 1–3 of this chapter are free-standing. That is, they are intended as independent of concepts of time held by philosophers other than Sartre. The author, however, has no intention of hiding his own Bergsonian-Jamesian alliances. The concluding section (4) utilizes earlier interpretations of Sartrean temporali-zation to critique Sartre in the light of Bergson's concept of inner duration. On this basis the chapter will argue that Bergson's concepts of temporality are more defensible than Sartre's, since they: (a) avoid the strict dualism that Sartre trumpets and then neglects; (b) allow the necessary appropriation of the present by the past; and (c) insist on the process of maturation necessary to the emergence of new ideas and veridical new acts.
