Why did Henri Bergson believe science has difficulty capturing duration?

Henri Bergson argued that science struggles to capture duration because it fundamentally relies on a spatialized conception of time. While lived time—or duration—is a continuous, qualitative flow experienced by the inner self, scientific time is measured by clocks and mathematical models that treat time as a series of discrete, quantitative points.1

Bergson observed that positive science essentially functions by eliminating duration, effectively replacing the fluid reality of time with a static, spatial representation. By attempting to quantify psychological facts and treat succession as a series of simultaneous points, science falsifies the nature of lived experience. For Bergson, this distinction was crucial; he believed that once the confusion between duration and extension, and between quality and quantity, is resolved, the deterministic arguments against human liberty lose their foundation.1