Bergson, Time and Free Will, Ch 1, §34 "The Sensation of Light. Qualitative Changes of Colour Interpreted as Quantitative Changes in Intensity of ..."

by Corry Shores
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[The following is summary; my commentary is in brackets.]

Bergson, Time and Free Will

(Essai sur les données immédiates de la conscience)

Chapter I, "The Intensity of Psychic States"

Part XIII: "Sensation of Light"

§34 "The Sensation of Light. Qualitative Changes of Colour Interpreted as Quantitative Changes in Intensity of Luminous Source"

When lights are dim, we have difficulty seeing things. When they are bright, we are dazzled. By increasing the the number of lights, the outlines of things become more clear. Also, things seem to alter in color as the amount of light increases or decreases. But we first believe that every object maintains its own color. So as the light dims and the object changes color, we mistakenly think instead that our sensation of the object is decreasing. Really, our consciousness receives a qualitative impression. Then our understanding erroneously interprets these qualitative impressions as quantitative ones. (51d)

Bergson then has us consider Helmholtz description of a similar incorrect interpretation. During different parts of the day, the sun gives off more-or-less light. Our bodies react more strongly when the sun is bright. And we mistakenly regard this as being a greater sensation of light, on account of the additional muscles involved when under its influence. Furthermore, we may re-create the white light of the sun by mixing certain colors. We use so much of one color, and so much of another, and together they produce white light. Then we equally increase the luminous intensity of both colors. The resulting white light remains the same color. However, we have a very disproportional increase in what seems to be the intensity of light sensation. But really the luminosity of our experimental lights were not increased very much. We use the sun's light as our standard for white light. And as we mentioned, our bodies react very strongly to changes in the sun's luminosity. Hence when we see those same changes in shade in the experimental lights, we interpret the sensation as increasing. But really there were only qualitative changes in our light sensations. (51-52)

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Images from the pages summarized above, in the English Translation [click on the image for an enlargement]:

Images from the pages summarized above, in the original French [click on the image for an enlargement]:

Bergson, Henri. Time and Free Will: An Essay on the Immediate Data of Consciousness, Transl. F. L. Pogson, (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 2001).

Available online at:

http://www.archive.org/details/timeandfreewill00pogsgoog

French text from:

Bergson, Henri. Essai sur les données immédiates de la conscience. Originally published Paris: Les Presses universitaires de France, 1888.

http://www.archive.org/details/essaisurlesdonn00berguoft