Matter and Memory

Bergson, Henri

ISBN 10: 0942299043 / ISBN 13: 9780942299045

Published by MIT Press, 1988

About this Item

Seller Inventory # 89K69_40_0942299043

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Matter and Memory
• Publisher: MIT Press
• Publication Date: 1988
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0942299043
• ISBN 13: 9780942299045
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

“Since the end of the last century,” Walter Benjamin wrote, “philosophy has made a series of attempts to lay hold of the ‘true’ experience as opposed to the kind that manifests itself in the standardized, denatured life of the civilized masses. It is customary to classify these efforts under the heading of a philosophy of life. Towering above this literature is Henri Bergson’s early monumental work Matter and Memory.”

Along with Husserl’s Ideas and Heidegger’s Being and Time, Bergson’s work represents one of the great twentieth-century investigations into perception and memory, movement and time, matter and mind. Arguably Bergson’s most significant book, Matter and Memory is essential to an understanding of his philosophy and its legacy.

This new edition includes an annotated bibliography prepared by Bruno Paradis.

From the Back Cover

In one of his most important philosophical writings, Henri Bergson here discusses how the matter of the brain and the world external to the body create mental impressions and memories. Matter and Memory, first published in 1912, introduced the current selectionist theories of memory, which postulate that there is a part of the brain that generates all possible images to be stored in memory and a part of the brain that chooses which images to store.

Crossing academic disciplines and touching on matters that concern us all--how do we remember, and why?--this essential work will enthrall students of philosophy and psychology and lay readers alike.