Ask HN: How do you visualise time (years/months)?
2 comments
I see time as a piece of string. Exactly how it appears depends on context.
Usually it is coiled up. The smallest coils might be days, the larger coils they form are then weeks or months, then years, perhaps decades or centuries if I'm considering historical events.
On a lower level, sometimes there are coils on the level of minutes and hours, or perhaps of ten minute appointment slots if I am waiting to be seen by a doctor.
Sometimes a piece of string is just a flat, boring piece of string, with the past on the left and the future on the right.
Sometimes the string gets tangled with itself --- the points that touch represent dates when related events occured.
Usually it is coiled up. The smallest coils might be days, the larger coils they form are then weeks or months, then years, perhaps decades or centuries if I'm considering historical events.
On a lower level, sometimes there are coils on the level of minutes and hours, or perhaps of ten minute appointment slots if I am waiting to be seen by a doctor.
Sometimes a piece of string is just a flat, boring piece of string, with the past on the left and the future on the right.
Sometimes the string gets tangled with itself --- the points that touch represent dates when related events occured.
Ah, I forgot to mention I did ask someone and they also saw time as a coil, though without the variations of context that you describe.
Its fascinating how although we all use calendars to plan time we still visualise it in drastically different ways! Thanks for your comment.
Its fascinating how although we all use calendars to plan time we still visualise it in drastically different ways! Thanks for your comment.
How do you see the next weeks/months?
How do you break up the year into chunks: by weeks, months, seasons, based on holidays?
How do imagine previous years? If I ask you what happened in August 2004 how do you visualise it?
Below is the way I see things to help you give your answer:
I see the year as on oval track viewed from above, wider horizontally, with summer on the left and winter on the right. That would put May on the bottom left just before a differently shaded block which represents the summer holidays (still at Uni). There is also a shaded block for each of November break, Winter break and Spring/Easter break. We also have a two weeks off after our exams in January. That block however is not as prominently shaded as the others. I suspect this is because I have only had this holiday 'slot' since University and it hasn't been as deeply engraved in my visualisation.
It is hard for me to visualise different years, I can just about see a stack of tracks on top of each other, with previous years being further down the stack. It is hard to remember what happened in any one particular year but I can remember what part of the year something happened fairly easily.
I have asked friends and I have had many different responses from seeing weeks/months as receipt papers, or a round race track (viewed from a human eye level perspective) with little hills representing weeks and looking around the other side of the track when imagining another time of year. I also had responses where the person did not see years in any time dependant way but as a collection of bubbles/galaxies floating around with links between them. Each bubble represented a different surrounding, sometimes related to location and sometimes to friend circles.
Please post your versions as a direct reply and comment on others as you feel fit. Also I have not researched any academic material relating to the matter, I want first hand responses out of pure curiosity, however feel free to post interesting links you may find.