Peter and Paul: a Ghost Story?

For Bergson, Special Relativity affirms the unity of real Time more rigorously than either Newtonian mechanics or common sense. Yet, time and unity describe different realities in the metaphysics of Einstein’s theory and the metaphysics of Bergson’s creative duration. The time Einstein adopts as the fourth dimension of space is only a ‘mobile image of eternity’, and the unity it preaches is an abstract unity, synonymous with mathematical invariance. This is why, according to Bergson, Einstein’s Relativity is not completely relative. It admits a unique real Time in the sense that it admits only one: that of the physicist engaged in measuring the world. The so-called twin paradox is exemplary in this respect