Henri Bergson on why the existence of things precedes their possibility

In his essay ‘The Possible and the Real’ (1930), the French philosopher Henri Bergson argued that perhaps the most foundational question of metaphysics – ‘Why is there something instead of nothing?’ – is poorly conceived, reflecting a mistaken view that ‘there is less in the idea of void than in the idea of fullness’. Building from this starting point he suggests – to put it all a bit simply – a metaphysics sprung instead from the fullness of the evolving reality in which we ceaselessly find ourselves. This experimental video essay from Epoché Magazine pairs text excerpted from ‘The Possible and the Real’ with archival imagery and original music. Drawing out Bergson’s themes in unexpected ways, the short gives Bergson’s influential words a curious new life nearly a century after they were first published.