The clock does not measure time; it produces it(noemamag.com)
noemamag.com
The clock does not measure time; it produces it
https://www.noemamag.com/the-tyranny-of-time/
148 comments
So much more insightful, concise, entertaining, and relatable than TFA.
We hate our 9-5's but we're also annoyed when the plumber gives us an 8 hour window to show up (and misses the window).
Like many rules, timetables can be an inconvenience when imposed on ourselves but very convenient when imposed on others.
We hate our 9-5's but we're also annoyed when the plumber gives us an 8 hour window to show up (and misses the window).
Like many rules, timetables can be an inconvenience when imposed on ourselves but very convenient when imposed on others.
Never expected to read someone complaining about those newfangled sundials.
This is really not the article for me. It's written by someone who, I infer, agrees that Newton "Destroyed the poetry of the rainbow by reducing it to a prism." [1]. And that is so alien to my experience of understanding things and defining things that I fail to relate to the text. I'm very much on the "it only adds" side of things [2][3].
That being said, consider a meeting that happens "on the second Tuesday of each month". The number of days between each meeting is so haphazard and ridiculous... if you rebooted human society, that definition would not survive unchanged. There's a clear example of the spandrels in our time keeping system reaching out and affecting the actions we take.
1: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Keats (search for text "prism")
2: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/184384-i-have-a-friend-who-...
3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbFM3rn4ldo
That being said, consider a meeting that happens "on the second Tuesday of each month". The number of days between each meeting is so haphazard and ridiculous... if you rebooted human society, that definition would not survive unchanged. There's a clear example of the spandrels in our time keeping system reaching out and affecting the actions we take.
1: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Keats (search for text "prism")
2: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/184384-i-have-a-friend-who-...
3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbFM3rn4ldo
Just as in computers, the value of a clock is that it enables efficient distributed computing and scale.
When you mainly interacted with a few dozen people all in the same village, how to coordinate your activities and synchronize with each other was not much of an issue. Everyone lived in close proximity and pretty much had the same culture and did the same things. If you wanted to talk with the chief, you could easily see when he had a bit of downtime and jump in.
However, once you are spread out, this becomes much harder. Imagine if the only way to coordinate a meeting with a teammate was to constantly poll them, asking if they are available. “Are you free, now? Are you free, now?” That basically tie up your whole day waiting for them to be free.
Clocks enable asynchrony. You two can quickly agree on a time, and then you can get on with your other stuff until the agreed upon time.
When you mainly interacted with a few dozen people all in the same village, how to coordinate your activities and synchronize with each other was not much of an issue. Everyone lived in close proximity and pretty much had the same culture and did the same things. If you wanted to talk with the chief, you could easily see when he had a bit of downtime and jump in.
However, once you are spread out, this becomes much harder. Imagine if the only way to coordinate a meeting with a teammate was to constantly poll them, asking if they are available. “Are you free, now? Are you free, now?” That basically tie up your whole day waiting for them to be free.
Clocks enable asynchrony. You two can quickly agree on a time, and then you can get on with your other stuff until the agreed upon time.
> Clocks enable asynchrony. You two can quickly agree on a time, and then you can get on with your other stuff until the agreed upon time.
Yes you need a "clock", but not necessarily one that reads like "2:23am". Perfectly fine to say "meet on the dueling grounds at dawn."
Yes you need a "clock", but not necessarily one that reads like "2:23am". Perfectly fine to say "meet on the dueling grounds at dawn."
So much hand-wringing in these comments. Let me try to help: the advent society-wide timekeeping mechanims with more (sundials) and more (mechanical clocks) and more (atomic clocks) accuracy fomented the emergence of habits and patterns of interactions unimaginable by humans and their societies before these facilities became widely available. Some of these emergent properties conveyed advantages that aided conquest and empire building, not unlike Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs, and Steel".
It's kind of like watching an action movie from the 1980s with a modern teenager and trying to explain why the hero/victim didn't simply use their mobile phone to text or call for help. Those with the facility can literally not fathom life without it, except as some kind of vague thought experiment.
It's kind of like watching an action movie from the 1980s with a modern teenager and trying to explain why the hero/victim didn't simply use their mobile phone to text or call for help. Those with the facility can literally not fathom life without it, except as some kind of vague thought experiment.
I just realized the noema magazine is part of the Berggruen think tank... Its neither remotely scientific nor written with honest intent. What are the goals this think tank is supposed to advance?
Seeing Like a State by James C. Scott also covers similar themes, on measurement and other societal standardization, although I don't recall that it touched on timekeeping directly.
Revolution in Time by David Landes supposedly (I haven't read it, though it's been on my list for a while) touches on this, and how timekeeping fundamentally changed life and civilization.
Speaking of time and sleep, I have always been fascinated with the concept of "first sleep, second sleep".
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20220107-the-lost-medieva...
I have tried it - it's like having TWO mornings in one day. It's kind of amazing, but it's completely incompatible with modern life (although less so with the new regime of more work/life balance flexibility).
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20220107-the-lost-medieva...
I have tried it - it's like having TWO mornings in one day. It's kind of amazing, but it's completely incompatible with modern life (although less so with the new regime of more work/life balance flexibility).
Much discussion about that article a couple of weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29886907
> We discipline our lives by the time on the clock.
That which moves in sync with the constituent parts of a clock is itself a piece of the clock. I've always found it a (mildly) disturbing notion that many clockwork pieces come in human shapes.
That which moves in sync with the constituent parts of a clock is itself a piece of the clock. I've always found it a (mildly) disturbing notion that many clockwork pieces come in human shapes.
I had a very hard time following the point of this article. Didn't make it. It felt like the template was somethink like this:
Step 1: Make a claim about time/clock
Step 2: Throw a bunch of random facts that are true and conceptually related to time but really don't prove at all the claim made previously.
Step 3: Repeat
Also, clocks absolutelly do measure time and not produce it. Time was a thing before clocks came to be
Step 1: Make a claim about time/clock
Step 2: Throw a bunch of random facts that are true and conceptually related to time but really don't prove at all the claim made previously.
Step 3: Repeat
Also, clocks absolutelly do measure time and not produce it. Time was a thing before clocks came to be
The human experience of linear time predates clocks, yes. But before clocks, we used natural phenomena as trigger events for our activities - the rising of the sun to wake up, the blooming of a certain flower to start plowing the fields. When, exactly, do we start plowing? At "flower bloom" o'clock.
But you can't coordinate larger activities with these natural phenomena, which are regional and also variable. So instead we invent a system of trigger events that are not tied the natural world. We call the event the second, and it happens whenever this device says it does. The clock, and the second-events it produces, are our invention. That's what I got, anyway :)
But you can't coordinate larger activities with these natural phenomena, which are regional and also variable. So instead we invent a system of trigger events that are not tied the natural world. We call the event the second, and it happens whenever this device says it does. The clock, and the second-events it produces, are our invention. That's what I got, anyway :)
The entire point of leap seconds is to make sure that our system of time keeping stays tied to the natural world. The same is true of leap years and time zones, but leap seconds are very direct in that they are introduced as way to always keep our time keeping system within one second of the planet's rotation, no matter how irregular the latter is.
> So instead we invent a system of trigger events that are not tied the natural world
Not quite, all measurement is tied to the natural world, we've just been moving away from less stable and predictible events to more deterministic.
Yes we have made up units of measurements that maybe arbitrary, but still tied to the physical world and dependent on natural properties.
Nevertheless, it felt like the article was trying to prove there is something inherently evil with clocks that has been under our radar for ages, which is silly. And even if that was true (clocks being strictly tied to constructs of power)... this still doesn't mean that "clocks produce time". Maybe the title is just wrong?
Not quite, all measurement is tied to the natural world, we've just been moving away from less stable and predictible events to more deterministic.
Yes we have made up units of measurements that maybe arbitrary, but still tied to the physical world and dependent on natural properties.
Nevertheless, it felt like the article was trying to prove there is something inherently evil with clocks that has been under our radar for ages, which is silly. And even if that was true (clocks being strictly tied to constructs of power)... this still doesn't mean that "clocks produce time". Maybe the title is just wrong?
Indeed, a day is still a day and a year a year, even if we split a minute into 60 seconds. It is all tied to the sun (stars) and the place of our planet relative to it.
We have leap years and seconds to keep our time synchronized with the universe (because of small round-off errors, if I may call it like that).
We have leap years and seconds to keep our time synchronized with the universe (because of small round-off errors, if I may call it like that).
I just made this account to respond to this criticism. Let me see if I can do that :-
> Not quite, all measurement is tied to the natural world, we've just been moving away from less stable and predictible events to more deterministic.
That is very true, but measurements are not natural world. Just to take an example from software world, ability to solve leetcode questions is tied to general software engineering ability, but it would be a mistake to say that it is the ability. Leetcode style questions do not sit at the root of software engineering ability, its at best an important branch of the tree.
Note that the problem here is not with a good measure or a bad measure of software engineering ability. The question is more about what it means to be a good software engineer, and thats not an objective question, thats a moral question and we will all disagree on an answer.
Note that if time was just part of natural sciences like Physics, then we could come up with one theory and test it out. But time is not just a laboratory thing, its also a tool that humans use. And that makes it more than a natural science question, its also a humanities question, just like leetcode and iq tests are.
> Nevertheless, it felt like the article was trying to prove there is something inherently evil with clocks that has been under our radar for ages, which is silly. And even if that was true (clocks being strictly tied to constructs of power)... this still doesn't mean that "clocks produce time". Maybe the title is just wrong?
Every technology has an ideological bias to it, but technologies will try to convince you that they are neutral. A very good example would be how you say "inherently" evil. Actually, clock has both inherent evils and inherent goods. You're already aware of the goods and the article pointed out the evils. This has not been hidden and such technological criticism can even be found in Plato's works. More accurately, for clocks specifically, Lewis Mumford gave the thesis the book expands upon in 1930s and he lists out references in his work about folks who have pointed out these things even earlier.
> Not quite, all measurement is tied to the natural world, we've just been moving away from less stable and predictible events to more deterministic.
That is very true, but measurements are not natural world. Just to take an example from software world, ability to solve leetcode questions is tied to general software engineering ability, but it would be a mistake to say that it is the ability. Leetcode style questions do not sit at the root of software engineering ability, its at best an important branch of the tree.
Note that the problem here is not with a good measure or a bad measure of software engineering ability. The question is more about what it means to be a good software engineer, and thats not an objective question, thats a moral question and we will all disagree on an answer.
Note that if time was just part of natural sciences like Physics, then we could come up with one theory and test it out. But time is not just a laboratory thing, its also a tool that humans use. And that makes it more than a natural science question, its also a humanities question, just like leetcode and iq tests are.
> Nevertheless, it felt like the article was trying to prove there is something inherently evil with clocks that has been under our radar for ages, which is silly. And even if that was true (clocks being strictly tied to constructs of power)... this still doesn't mean that "clocks produce time". Maybe the title is just wrong?
Every technology has an ideological bias to it, but technologies will try to convince you that they are neutral. A very good example would be how you say "inherently" evil. Actually, clock has both inherent evils and inherent goods. You're already aware of the goods and the article pointed out the evils. This has not been hidden and such technological criticism can even be found in Plato's works. More accurately, for clocks specifically, Lewis Mumford gave the thesis the book expands upon in 1930s and he lists out references in his work about folks who have pointed out these things even earlier.
You've just outlined how deconstruction works. It's a cancer, and the ironic part is that those currently employing it against past structures do not see the time coming where their own "new structures" are deconstructed.
I love this argument. It's the same with science. We shouldn't collect evidence that overturns the current theories because in the future we might collect even more evidence that and overturn future theories. We must remain intellectually stunted lest we make any progress at all.
Your comment intruiges me but I don't quite understand it. Can you rephrase it please? What are past and new structures you are talking of?
I don't completely agree with him, but I interpreted him as saying:
Deconstruction is often employed in intellectually dishonest (or lazy) ways to discredit concepts by creating/employing tenuous links between a concept and its socio-cultural associations and refusing to actually elaborate on why they matter. This is often done in order to attack a concept for political reasons (as opposed to strictly intellectual ones), and people who do this are committing a tactical error. Giving legitimacy to these intellectually vacuous attacks as a tactic ensures that they'll be used against currently popular ideas in the future when they fall out of vogue.
Deconstruction is often employed in intellectually dishonest (or lazy) ways to discredit concepts by creating/employing tenuous links between a concept and its socio-cultural associations and refusing to actually elaborate on why they matter. This is often done in order to attack a concept for political reasons (as opposed to strictly intellectual ones), and people who do this are committing a tactical error. Giving legitimacy to these intellectually vacuous attacks as a tactic ensures that they'll be used against currently popular ideas in the future when they fall out of vogue.
I think Mezzie did a good job of elaborating in an eloquent way what I was saying in a hurry as I was walking out the door. I would only add to their comments that deconstruction is an ouroboros and will continue to devour itself as the morality spiral towards utopian ideological purity continues. You might be the most moral leader of the movement today, but future leaders will cast what you are doing now as "not enough" and "misguided" and especially "problematic" and you will be cast out and replaced. The history of the early years of the Soviet Revolution are the best historical example of what I'm talking about with the Trotskyites, the Leninists, and the Stalinists all accusing each other of not being the "real" or "true" form of communism using the same deconstruction techniques.
> Didn't make it.
Same. I got halfway through and gave up because it didn’t say anything meaningful.
I was hoping there was something interesting in there but no. At least not unless it was hidden in the last half of the drivel.
Same. I got halfway through and gave up because it didn’t say anything meaningful.
I was hoping there was something interesting in there but no. At least not unless it was hidden in the last half of the drivel.
Clocks are obviously not a social construct,
its punctuality that is culture-bound
variable author tries to 'deconstruct'
without being aware of different cultural contexts which not always work 'by the clock', e.g.
https://www.insider.com/how-different-cultures-see-punctuali...
If you expect to read about quantum physics of time converging into "the clock", this article tells none of it, it stays on a socio-biological level.
"Repent, Harlequin!" Said the Ticktockman. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%22Repent,_Harlequin!%22_Said_...
> Stylistically, the story deliberately ignores many "rules of good writing", including a paragraph about jelly beans which is almost entirely one run-on sentence.
> Language such as “failure to progress” is common when a woman doesn’t perform to the expected curve, and diversion from the clock-time framework can be used to justify medical intervention. This is one of the reasons that the home-birthing movement has recently grown in popularity.
Of course these medical interventions have greatly reduced the number of women who die in childbirth.
Of course these medical interventions have greatly reduced the number of women who die in childbirth.
Well, no. Medical interventions that save lives are not clock-based but skill-based. An emergency C-section works just as well at 41 weeks as it does at 40 weeks.
Time-based medical interventions include, for example, inducing labor if the doctor doesn’t think it is starting fast enough. Those are associated with complications, although usually not fatal ones.
Time-based medical interventions include, for example, inducing labor if the doctor doesn’t think it is starting fast enough. Those are associated with complications, although usually not fatal ones.
But are the complications from the intervention or from the reason-the-doctor-is-worried-and-intervening? You're implicitly comparing P(complication|intervene) with P(complication|not intervene) but you should probably be comparing P(complication|intervene and want_to_intervene) to P(complication|not intervene and want_to_intervene).
You seem to be conflating two related but distinct ideas. On the one hand, the availability of high-quality science-based medical care has been nothing short of a miracle.
On the other hand, the hubris shown by doctors (and generally speaking only MDs, not DOs or nursing staff) is incredible. MDs have a tendency to assume that they alone are able to fix things, and the attitude seems to be that patient rights just get in the way.
We see this pattern over and over: doctors tend to not believe in a medical effect until they personally experience it. The treatment of pregnancy and childbirth is one prime example; the history of post-viral syndrome being another good one.
On the other hand, the hubris shown by doctors (and generally speaking only MDs, not DOs or nursing staff) is incredible. MDs have a tendency to assume that they alone are able to fix things, and the attitude seems to be that patient rights just get in the way.
We see this pattern over and over: doctors tend to not believe in a medical effect until they personally experience it. The treatment of pregnancy and childbirth is one prime example; the history of post-viral syndrome being another good one.
Funny how such little details that don't fit The Narrative get omitted from this sort of article.
what's "The Narrative"? sounds like some kind of conspiracy?
It's just the story this author is pushing, characterizing time as a form of oppression against women, and dovetailing with other narratives that try to reduce every Western concept and institution to forms of oppression.
If rules relating to time exist to help women not die during childbirth, that's inconvenient for the article's chosen single perspective ("The Narrative") and must therefore be omitted.
If actions taken on a timetable are a difficult trade-off, it becomes much harder to simply characterize them as oppression.
If rules relating to time exist to help women not die during childbirth, that's inconvenient for the article's chosen single perspective ("The Narrative") and must therefore be omitted.
If actions taken on a timetable are a difficult trade-off, it becomes much harder to simply characterize them as oppression.
For anyone interested in reading more about this, E.P. Thompson’s Time, Work-Discipline, and Industrial Capitalism is a really good read, especially if you follow his citations to Lewis Mumford and others. Although industrial capitalism has sort of faded in some parts of the world, the insights I think are as relevant as ever. The author mentions Mumford once, but the central thesis seems taken directly from Technics and Civilization:
> The clock, not the steam-engine, is the key-machine of the modern industrial age... the clock, moreover, is a piece of power-machinery whose "product" is seconds and minutes: by it essential nature it dissociated time from human events and helped create the belief in an independent world of mathematically measurable sequences: the special world of science.
> The clock, not the steam-engine, is the key-machine of the modern industrial age... the clock, moreover, is a piece of power-machinery whose "product" is seconds and minutes: by it essential nature it dissociated time from human events and helped create the belief in an independent world of mathematically measurable sequences: the special world of science.
If anything forms of late/post capitalism are even more concerned with time than industrial capitalism - one might say that industrial capitalism formally subsumed time measurement, while today's attention economy really subsumed it.
I’m currently reading 4000 Weeks (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54785515-four-thousand-w...), which is something as interesting as a time management book that starts with a chapter quite similar to this article - explaining how time is a social construct and that you’ll probably fail if you just try to get more things done.
“We are “time binding” animals, as the American economist and social theorist Jeremy Rifkin put it in his 1987 book, “Time Wars.””
The concept of time-binding predates Rifkin by a few decades.
For a start, S I Hayakawa writes about Time-Binding Theory in this 1950 article “THE AIMS AND TASKS OF GENERAL SEMANTICS: Implications of the Time-Binding Theory (Part I)”
https://www.jstor.org/stable/42578071
For those old enough, yes, that S I Hayakawa who was a former US Senator representing the great State of California. Some California politicians go/are Hollywood, some write best-selling books about the nature of words, rhetoric and the psychology of humans. It’s quite a big state.
And Hayakawa is just expounding on the idea developed by Korzybski in the 1920s/1930s and discussed in the foundational text for General Semantics, Science and Sanity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Korzybski
[General Semantics, which is still around, is perhaps the most mild-mannered populist intellectual movement produced by the 20th Century. If you’ve heard the phrase “the map is not the territory”, that’s General Semantics. If you wish to dig further, there is basically no emotional/financial/intellectual/psychological/social downside risk to pursuing General Semantics. There is no “ism” associated with it. It’s pretty close to an Absolute Good. Read Hayakawa’s books first.]
The concept of time-binding predates Rifkin by a few decades.
For a start, S I Hayakawa writes about Time-Binding Theory in this 1950 article “THE AIMS AND TASKS OF GENERAL SEMANTICS: Implications of the Time-Binding Theory (Part I)”
https://www.jstor.org/stable/42578071
For those old enough, yes, that S I Hayakawa who was a former US Senator representing the great State of California. Some California politicians go/are Hollywood, some write best-selling books about the nature of words, rhetoric and the psychology of humans. It’s quite a big state.
And Hayakawa is just expounding on the idea developed by Korzybski in the 1920s/1930s and discussed in the foundational text for General Semantics, Science and Sanity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Korzybski
[General Semantics, which is still around, is perhaps the most mild-mannered populist intellectual movement produced by the 20th Century. If you’ve heard the phrase “the map is not the territory”, that’s General Semantics. If you wish to dig further, there is basically no emotional/financial/intellectual/psychological/social downside risk to pursuing General Semantics. There is no “ism” associated with it. It’s pretty close to an Absolute Good. Read Hayakawa’s books first.]
Folks on HN talk about resisting the clock all the time without realizing it.
They want to work from home because the lack of commute makes for a more relaxing morning and evening. Why is it more relaxing? Because we have more time to work with. It’s more flexible.
Working from home also offers greater flexibility in other aspects of time. You can do domestic chores when it makes sense and not just in the hours outside office time (which are indirectly dictated by the office schedule).
Do you like lots of meetings? As scheduled blocks of time they are direct manifestations of the shared clock. Or do you prefer to have large blocks of unscheduled time that you can organize yourself?
Devs often sneer at the idea of being forced to sit at a desk for a fixed and regular set of hours every work day. “Measure my work by my output, not a time sheet”—sound familiar?
Knowledge work is less dependent on universal clock time than other industries like manufacturing, retail, transportation, etc. Measuring time is super important for things like how fast a web page loads, or recovering from an outage. But when it comes to developing the business itself, time is more relative. “Time to market” is not a fixed set of hours, but a relative sense of beating competitors.
A universal way of measuring time is obviously a useful tool, and has been critical to many advances in human society. But there is a difference between looking at a clock for your own purposes (e.g. timing your runs to measure your fitness), and looking at a clock because you are trying to satisfy someone else’s expectations. Especially when there is a power dynamic, like with employers.
They want to work from home because the lack of commute makes for a more relaxing morning and evening. Why is it more relaxing? Because we have more time to work with. It’s more flexible.
Working from home also offers greater flexibility in other aspects of time. You can do domestic chores when it makes sense and not just in the hours outside office time (which are indirectly dictated by the office schedule).
Do you like lots of meetings? As scheduled blocks of time they are direct manifestations of the shared clock. Or do you prefer to have large blocks of unscheduled time that you can organize yourself?
Devs often sneer at the idea of being forced to sit at a desk for a fixed and regular set of hours every work day. “Measure my work by my output, not a time sheet”—sound familiar?
Knowledge work is less dependent on universal clock time than other industries like manufacturing, retail, transportation, etc. Measuring time is super important for things like how fast a web page loads, or recovering from an outage. But when it comes to developing the business itself, time is more relative. “Time to market” is not a fixed set of hours, but a relative sense of beating competitors.
A universal way of measuring time is obviously a useful tool, and has been critical to many advances in human society. But there is a difference between looking at a clock for your own purposes (e.g. timing your runs to measure your fitness), and looking at a clock because you are trying to satisfy someone else’s expectations. Especially when there is a power dynamic, like with employers.
This isn’t a comment about clocks at all. You’re talking about being free from office culture and sticking the word “clock” in there.
If anything, clocks liberate hours from employers. I’m pretty sure that absent clocks (and legal restrictions to the contrary), employers would demand work from sunrise to sunset because that’s what they could measure.
> Folks on HN talk about resisting the clock all the time without realizing it.
This is a really stretched metaphor. This is like saying clocks kill is because “time catches up with us all”.
If anything, clocks liberate hours from employers. I’m pretty sure that absent clocks (and legal restrictions to the contrary), employers would demand work from sunrise to sunset because that’s what they could measure.
> Folks on HN talk about resisting the clock all the time without realizing it.
This is a really stretched metaphor. This is like saying clocks kill is because “time catches up with us all”.
If you say so, I’m looking at the clock in a lot of these situations.
A clock could not exist at all, and not having a 1 hour commute would still be favorable.
Resisting the waste of valuable time? Sure. Resisting the clock? I'd say it's the exact opposite. We are eyeing the clock every moment and realizing how much time we're wasting on idiotic things.
Resisting the waste of valuable time? Sure. Resisting the clock? I'd say it's the exact opposite. We are eyeing the clock every moment and realizing how much time we're wasting on idiotic things.
If clocks cause all that then the scale makes me fat.
"Time is a wealth of change, but the clock in its parody makes it mere change and no wealth." - Tagore.
While I do not agree with a lot of specifics in the article, I do sympathize with the overarching theme that we are being driven by our clocks and calendars today. If every day looks exactly same as the day before, did time pass?
While I do not agree with a lot of specifics in the article, I do sympathize with the overarching theme that we are being driven by our clocks and calendars today. If every day looks exactly same as the day before, did time pass?
I can confirm that it did by measure of my knees hurting more and sudden need of reading glasses. Time passing is real and it sucks.
Clocks are an accident of latitude.
If the amount of daylight in higher latitudes didn't change so dramatically throughout the year, clocks wouldn't be needed to ensure every day is the same duration.
If the amount of daylight in higher latitudes didn't change so dramatically throughout the year, clocks wouldn't be needed to ensure every day is the same duration.
that's great but how do I make my appointments if we don't have clocks
some cultures have a far less precise definition of punctuality.
Since that was bad, and the topic is wonderful, may I offer something very good on this topic instead?
It is a book called Einstein's Dreams. Thank me later.
It is a book called Einstein's Dreams. Thank me later.
Please tell me this is a satirical inside joke in reference to the current political climate.
Clocks with a hand that circles once per day are as old as the clock itself:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/24-hour_analog_dial
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/24-hour_analog_dial
This one also does one rotarion per day, maybe the oldest out there.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sundial
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sundial
If clock produces time - can I create super slow clock and dodge bullets?
This article's a great example (albeit an utterly ludicrous one) of how critical/postmodern theories work. They roughly follow these steps:
1. Pick a random concept
2. Talk about how the concept doesn't always apply, isn't always useful, and that it contains arbitrary elements (e.g. the 7 day week)
3. Point out how the concept influences language, and assert or imply that language has an enourmous influence on how people behave ("Contemporary society is obsessed with time — it is the most used noun in the English language")
4. Talk about how the concept is viewed differently in different cultures, making sure to imply that this means it's arbitrary
5. Assert that the concept is rooted in colonialism, imperialism, racism, whiteness, and patriarchy.
6. Conclude that this means the concept is completely arbitrary, and was created by those in power for the sole purpose of oppressing others.
7. Pat yourself on the back, and feel proud that your genius-level intellect allows you to see how things really are.
1. Pick a random concept
2. Talk about how the concept doesn't always apply, isn't always useful, and that it contains arbitrary elements (e.g. the 7 day week)
3. Point out how the concept influences language, and assert or imply that language has an enourmous influence on how people behave ("Contemporary society is obsessed with time — it is the most used noun in the English language")
4. Talk about how the concept is viewed differently in different cultures, making sure to imply that this means it's arbitrary
5. Assert that the concept is rooted in colonialism, imperialism, racism, whiteness, and patriarchy.
6. Conclude that this means the concept is completely arbitrary, and was created by those in power for the sole purpose of oppressing others.
7. Pat yourself on the back, and feel proud that your genius-level intellect allows you to see how things really are.
really the worst invention, before they invented the clock everyone was immortal
Here some "gems":
>That mathematical construct has been shaped over centuries by science, yes, but also power, religion, capitalism and colonialism. The clock is extremely useful as a social tool that helps us coordinate ourselves around the things we care about, but it is also deeply politically charged. And like anything political, it benefits some, marginalizes others and blinds us from a true understanding of what is really going on.
>During an era in which social constructs like race, gender and sexuality are being challenged and dismantled, the true nature of clock time has somehow escaped the attention of wider society. Much like has happened with money, the clock has come to be seen as the thing it was only supposed to represent: The clock has become time itself.
>Standardized time became vital for seafarers and irresistible to corporate interests, such was the ease it could offer trade, transport and electric communication. But it took longer to colonize the minds of the general public.
>In reality, this process had already been taking place throughout the 1800s as a result of European colonialism, imperialism and oppression. Colonialism was not just a conquest of land, and therefore space, but also a conquest of time. From South Asia to Africa to Oceania, imperialists assaulted alternative forms of timekeeping. They saw any region without European-style clocks, watches and church bells as a land without time.
>The Western separation of clock time from the rhythms of nature helped imperialists establish superiority over other cultures.
>Even the most natural of processes now must be expressed in clock time in order for them to be validated
>Women in particular often find themselves at the wrong end of this arbitrary metric. Unpaid labor such as housework and childcare — which still disproportionately burdens women — seems to slip between the measurements of the clock, whereas the experience of pregnancy is very much under the scrutiny of clock time. Adam quotes a woman’s account of her birth-giving experience: “The woman in labor, forced by the intensity of the contractions to turn all her attention to them, loses her ordinary, intimate contact with clock time.” But in the hospital environment, where the natural process of childbirth has been evaluated and standardized in clock-time units, a woman is pressured to follow what Alys Einion-Waller, a professor of midwifery at Swansea University, has called a “medicalized birth script.”
>Clock time may have colonized the planet, but it did not completely destroy alternative traditions of timekeeping. Certain religions maintain a connection to time that is rooted in nature, like salat in Islam and zmanim in Judaism, in which prayer times are defined by natural phenomena like dawn, dusk and the positioning of stars. The timing of these events may be converted into clock time, but they are not determined by clocks.
This is such a mess, the writer is constantly mixing up the concepts of clock, clock time, standardized time, geological time, earth rotating, circadian time... which he does not bother to differentiate making it easy to come to his programmatically set conclusions of oppressor and oppressed.
The cultural aspect of timekeeping going back to humans wondering about the regularities in sun movmement at day and about the "other suns" and objects at night is quite fascinating and probably as "astronomy" the oldest preform of science in reproducibility and predictive power (astrology aside :D); to butcher it up in such a manner, imho a very poor choice.
For anyone interested in appreciating the art of keeping track of time I would suggest looking up the two millennia old "astrolabe"[0]
[0]https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yioZhHe1i5M
>That mathematical construct has been shaped over centuries by science, yes, but also power, religion, capitalism and colonialism. The clock is extremely useful as a social tool that helps us coordinate ourselves around the things we care about, but it is also deeply politically charged. And like anything political, it benefits some, marginalizes others and blinds us from a true understanding of what is really going on.
>During an era in which social constructs like race, gender and sexuality are being challenged and dismantled, the true nature of clock time has somehow escaped the attention of wider society. Much like has happened with money, the clock has come to be seen as the thing it was only supposed to represent: The clock has become time itself.
>Standardized time became vital for seafarers and irresistible to corporate interests, such was the ease it could offer trade, transport and electric communication. But it took longer to colonize the minds of the general public.
>In reality, this process had already been taking place throughout the 1800s as a result of European colonialism, imperialism and oppression. Colonialism was not just a conquest of land, and therefore space, but also a conquest of time. From South Asia to Africa to Oceania, imperialists assaulted alternative forms of timekeeping. They saw any region without European-style clocks, watches and church bells as a land without time.
>The Western separation of clock time from the rhythms of nature helped imperialists establish superiority over other cultures.
>Even the most natural of processes now must be expressed in clock time in order for them to be validated
>Women in particular often find themselves at the wrong end of this arbitrary metric. Unpaid labor such as housework and childcare — which still disproportionately burdens women — seems to slip between the measurements of the clock, whereas the experience of pregnancy is very much under the scrutiny of clock time. Adam quotes a woman’s account of her birth-giving experience: “The woman in labor, forced by the intensity of the contractions to turn all her attention to them, loses her ordinary, intimate contact with clock time.” But in the hospital environment, where the natural process of childbirth has been evaluated and standardized in clock-time units, a woman is pressured to follow what Alys Einion-Waller, a professor of midwifery at Swansea University, has called a “medicalized birth script.”
>Clock time may have colonized the planet, but it did not completely destroy alternative traditions of timekeeping. Certain religions maintain a connection to time that is rooted in nature, like salat in Islam and zmanim in Judaism, in which prayer times are defined by natural phenomena like dawn, dusk and the positioning of stars. The timing of these events may be converted into clock time, but they are not determined by clocks.
This is such a mess, the writer is constantly mixing up the concepts of clock, clock time, standardized time, geological time, earth rotating, circadian time... which he does not bother to differentiate making it easy to come to his programmatically set conclusions of oppressor and oppressed.
The cultural aspect of timekeeping going back to humans wondering about the regularities in sun movmement at day and about the "other suns" and objects at night is quite fascinating and probably as "astronomy" the oldest preform of science in reproducibility and predictive power (astrology aside :D); to butcher it up in such a manner, imho a very poor choice.
For anyone interested in appreciating the art of keeping track of time I would suggest looking up the two millennia old "astrolabe"[0]
[0]https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yioZhHe1i5M
> We usually eat our meals at appropriate clock times as opposed to whenever we are hungry, go to sleep at appropriate clock times as opposed to whenever we are tired
Well then you are doing it wrong. If you do stupid things don't blame the clock for it. :D
Well then you are doing it wrong. If you do stupid things don't blame the clock for it. :D
Hunger is actually fairly modifiable, as intermittent fasters know. If you are used to eat at a certain hour, you will feel pangs of hunger around it, but if you bridge the gap somehow, the feeling of hunger will go away again.
Definitely, I eat a single meal at night, and I don't get hungry until about an hour before super. No hunger pangs or anything, it only takes a few weeks to condition the body.
You’re sort of agreeing with the point of the article, which is that our internal sense of time does not always agree with externally imposed schedules. You just seem to be in a position to resist the external schedule.
Many people don’t have much of a choice, at least during their work week. Employees in hourly shifts usually cannot eat on the clock, so it’s breakfast before you leave, lunch on your midday break, and dinner when you get home.
Many people don’t have much of a choice, at least during their work week. Employees in hourly shifts usually cannot eat on the clock, so it’s breakfast before you leave, lunch on your midday break, and dinner when you get home.
This is no different for societies without clocks. I’m pretty certain that aboriginal people still living in their ancient ways don’t just stop individually to eat. They eat together (very likely after finishing a hunt). It’s not tied to the clock but it’s also very much not just “feeling hungry”. Eating is generally a social activity.
The clock is just a convenient way to get a group of people to agree what “eating time” is. They would do the same without.
The clock is just a convenient way to get a group of people to agree what “eating time” is. They would do the same without.
> after finishing a hunt
Which doesn't necessarily happen at the same time every hunt. There's no post-hunt retro at 1300 every day.
You're agreeing with the article that until very recently, event times were flexible and determined by processes that aren't the vibration of a piece of quartz.
Which doesn't necessarily happen at the same time every hunt. There's no post-hunt retro at 1300 every day.
You're agreeing with the article that until very recently, event times were flexible and determined by processes that aren't the vibration of a piece of quartz.
I did not say it was a constant time. I said it’s not tied to the “I’m hungry” event. Stopping to eat whenever one feels like it is a very privileged state historically.
I don’t think it’s accurate to say I agree with the article. Certainly clocks are a relatively recent invention. That doesn’t mean I agree with its central thesis, which I think is essentially unsupported by the various anecdotes and historical tidbits the article contains.
I don’t think it’s accurate to say I agree with the article. Certainly clocks are a relatively recent invention. That doesn’t mean I agree with its central thesis, which I think is essentially unsupported by the various anecdotes and historical tidbits the article contains.
This is true. I don't live in my mom's house because I'm an adult (and am above the poverty line). As such my partner and I have and exercise the agency to make meals when we're hungry and individually go to sleep when we're tired. Why shout at the mirror?
this is a little bit like replying to a discussion of advertising's effects on society with "ads don't work on me, lol".
>> as opposed to whenever we are hungry ... as opposed to whenever we are tired
>> Well then you are doing it wrong.
Yes, it is fun to be single and eat prepared foods. But some of us eat a particular time because that is when the food is ready, a decision made much earlier in the day and without consulting everyone who will be around the table. Some of us also have bosses in different time zones, or who at least don't care much for our preferred lunch break times.
And some of us have jobs where our shift times are not under our control. Or have kids. Or have an aircraft to fly to Seattle come morning. Being able to set one's work schedule, and therefore one's sleep times, isn't a health choice. It is a lifestyle privilege.
>> Well then you are doing it wrong.
Yes, it is fun to be single and eat prepared foods. But some of us eat a particular time because that is when the food is ready, a decision made much earlier in the day and without consulting everyone who will be around the table. Some of us also have bosses in different time zones, or who at least don't care much for our preferred lunch break times.
And some of us have jobs where our shift times are not under our control. Or have kids. Or have an aircraft to fly to Seattle come morning. Being able to set one's work schedule, and therefore one's sleep times, isn't a health choice. It is a lifestyle privilege.
Eating when you feel/are hungry can lead you into obesity or insulin resistance. The more you eat the stronger your cravings are and sooner you will be hungry.
Quenching fake hunger with a glass of water and eating more healthy will break this cycle.
Quenching fake hunger with a glass of water and eating more healthy will break this cycle.
This can be a dangerous advice; there is a risk when you talk about a complex illness and give specific advise. For me exercise and eating ok is good enough but that is not true for everyone so I try not to give those advice as a solution.
You're right, a HN comment doesn't do this subject any justice. Even a book might not be enough, as I have learned dealing with this issue for the past 5 years.
I wanted to refute that eating when hungry is ideal, it lead me to eating more often every day, eventually I was eating huge portions every 2 hours which resulted in insulin resistance.
I wanted to refute that eating when hungry is ideal, it lead me to eating more often every day, eventually I was eating huge portions every 2 hours which resulted in insulin resistance.
I can second that. I've been working on fixing my hunger pangs for the past year or so. "Eat only when hungry" can end up badly if you already have eating/hunger issues in the first place. I've recently gotten myself to a state where I finally feel full after eating a reasonably portioned meal. Before that, eating most foods would just paradoxically make me get even more hungry.
> I wanted to refute that eating when hungry is ideal
And you did refute that. It's not something the comment you responded to stated or implied but it's better to be clear about it.
Sorry to hear about your health troubles and I hope that you are on the path to recovery.
And you did refute that. It's not something the comment you responded to stated or implied but it's better to be clear about it.
Sorry to hear about your health troubles and I hope that you are on the path to recovery.
Oh so woke: “The Western separation of clock time from the rhythms of nature helped imperialists establish superiority over other cultures.”
Please: time is a necessary convention for virtually any complex society, and this drive or imposition to coordinate and predict events accurately goes back to any large culture, including most larger ancient civilizations; west, east, north, south.
Time control (aka, coordination of activity) has always bern critical in warfare, navigation, feasts, and fun social interactions.
What has changed is the precision and accuracy and near-synchrony that can now be achieved at a global scale.
The parent article adds much too much “Strum und Drang” about bad modern trends that divorce us from our pristine noble primitive and organic state. Right ;-)
Please: time is a necessary convention for virtually any complex society, and this drive or imposition to coordinate and predict events accurately goes back to any large culture, including most larger ancient civilizations; west, east, north, south.
Time control (aka, coordination of activity) has always bern critical in warfare, navigation, feasts, and fun social interactions.
What has changed is the precision and accuracy and near-synchrony that can now be achieved at a global scale.
The parent article adds much too much “Strum und Drang” about bad modern trends that divorce us from our pristine noble primitive and organic state. Right ;-)
Lol, love this. It’s amazing how you can frame a question or proposition when you are always pushing an answer.
> time is a necessary convention for virtually any complex society
It wasn't that people in the "unclocked" regime have no precision or scale in their use of time and synchrony, it was that the very nature of the (subjective) world changes when you change your (subjective) structure and orientation in time. Psychological models of time vary between cultures and individuals and have a deep and pervasive effect.
For example, some people organize their past and future along a line going left-right out in front of them (the past goes to the left, the future goes to the right, the present is in front) while other people have their past behind them and the future spreads out in front of them.
That simple difference, having your past and future in front in a line vs. being "inline" on your past-future timeline, has a profound effect on psychology and culture.
These are just two common styles, there is a vast diversity on how people organize their subjective structure of temporal events.
It wasn't that people in the "unclocked" regime have no precision or scale in their use of time and synchrony, it was that the very nature of the (subjective) world changes when you change your (subjective) structure and orientation in time. Psychological models of time vary between cultures and individuals and have a deep and pervasive effect.
For example, some people organize their past and future along a line going left-right out in front of them (the past goes to the left, the future goes to the right, the present is in front) while other people have their past behind them and the future spreads out in front of them.
That simple difference, having your past and future in front in a line vs. being "inline" on your past-future timeline, has a profound effect on psychology and culture.
These are just two common styles, there is a vast diversity on how people organize their subjective structure of temporal events.
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Fucking white people and their... shuffles deck, pulls card ... methods of timekeeping.
Out of all things, the author picked time to pick on. Time is one of the few physical things that are objective and real and still can be quite directly experienced by all humans regardless of cultural context or biases.
Nonsense article.
Out of all things, the author picked time to pick on. Time is one of the few physical things that are objective and real and still can be quite directly experienced by all humans regardless of cultural context or biases.
Nonsense article.
I think the ubiquity of clocks in western societies points to the fact that time cannot be directly perceived. Our perceptions of time are both individual and circumstantial. For instance, time dilation slows the apparent passage of time during sudden trauma like a car crash.
Even in computation, where time is ideally measured very precisely, event based applications are extremely common, far more so than absolute or even exact relative time applications.
Time is computationally and culturally important because of the need to synchronize. But cross cultural synchronization of meetings is hard even at the basic level because prevailing attitudes of “On time” are different in, say, Germany, Spain, and China.
Richard Lewis has written about these cultural differences of time. Here’s a sample of some of his observations. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-different-cultures-under...
Even in computation, where time is ideally measured very precisely, event based applications are extremely common, far more so than absolute or even exact relative time applications.
Time is computationally and culturally important because of the need to synchronize. But cross cultural synchronization of meetings is hard even at the basic level because prevailing attitudes of “On time” are different in, say, Germany, Spain, and China.
Richard Lewis has written about these cultural differences of time. Here’s a sample of some of his observations. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-different-cultures-under...
Did one of your pets ever die on you? You don't need clocks to suffer the consequences of time.
I think you are conflating time itself and measuring it (clocks).
I think you are conflating time itself and measuring it (clocks).
I think you're conflating time and the death of pets. Time doesn't kill pets, we use the death of pets to mark time (like clocks.)
edit: My cat died. Now, I can say that I moved house after my cat died, that I got my car before my cat died, or that I met Bill around the time my cat died. Dead pets create time.
edit: My cat died. Now, I can say that I moved house after my cat died, that I got my car before my cat died, or that I met Bill around the time my cat died. Dead pets create time.
Yes time kills pets...
No, a complex set of decay processes kills pets; time doesn't do anything. We label things that happen with time to organize causes and effects.
You might as well say that time does everything, but that's mistaking the way you keep track of a thing with the thing itself. Time typed this comment.
You might as well say that time does everything, but that's mistaking the way you keep track of a thing with the thing itself. Time typed this comment.
a complex set of decay processes that happens over time...
The moment you say the cat is "alive" you create time and you also start killing your cat.
In Buddhism there is no birth, no death. Both are illusions.
In Buddhism there is no birth, no death. Both are illusions.
Car crash is a good example. Speed is also perceived differently but you can tell the difference between crashing at 5mph and 100mph. The fact that brain “hides” some things from your conscience does not mean they don’t exist.
> Time is one of the few physical things that are objective and real […]
Don't look too closely at it, as things can get squirrelly the deeper you dig:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Order_of_Time_(book)
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlo_Rovelli
Edit: For those downvoting, you may wish to look up the question "Does time exist?":
* https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/apr/14/carlo-rovelli-...
* https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1888683587729
Calling it "objective and real" is… debatable. Certainly the "objective" part, as Einstein theorized and empirical observation has shown.
Don't look too closely at it, as things can get squirrelly the deeper you dig:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Order_of_Time_(book)
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlo_Rovelli
Edit: For those downvoting, you may wish to look up the question "Does time exist?":
* https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/apr/14/carlo-rovelli-...
* https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1888683587729
Calling it "objective and real" is… debatable. Certainly the "objective" part, as Einstein theorized and empirical observation has shown.
People have this strange idea that Einstein destroyed objectivity in physics and validated all their pet postmodern theories. It isn't true.
In relativity, time is a variable that is different for each observer, but it is still objective. It's not a matter of opinion for each observer. There are formulas that determine how all the variables change, and any observer can know what the other observers' variables are by watching how they move through space and using the formulas.
While some naive Newtonian concepts such as a single universal time metric stop working, there's no wiggle room for observer A and B to be inconsistent with one another based on their personal opinions. There is one objective reality and one objective way to quantify it mathematically.
Time isn't a single universal quantity in relativity, but it's still objective. Einstein didn't turn physics into cultural anthropology.
In relativity, time is a variable that is different for each observer, but it is still objective. It's not a matter of opinion for each observer. There are formulas that determine how all the variables change, and any observer can know what the other observers' variables are by watching how they move through space and using the formulas.
While some naive Newtonian concepts such as a single universal time metric stop working, there's no wiggle room for observer A and B to be inconsistent with one another based on their personal opinions. There is one objective reality and one objective way to quantify it mathematically.
Time isn't a single universal quantity in relativity, but it's still objective. Einstein didn't turn physics into cultural anthropology.
People have this strange idea that "subjective" means something equivalent to "unknowable" or "an opinion" or "as I please". It isn't true.
> a variable that is different for each observer
This is literally what "subjective" means - different dependent on the subject.
> a variable that is different for each observer
This is literally what "subjective" means - different dependent on the subject.
It's not different dependent on the subject, it's different for different inertial reference frames, but identical for every subject existing in the same reference frame. In Einstein's thought experiments with trains moving at relativistic speeds, every observer on that train has the same time.
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It's more what you'd call "relative". You could probably call it "subjective" if the meaning of the word weren't so loaded.
Not sure why you are being downvoted for this, it's very helpful. We should draw a distinction between relative and subjective. A measurement of time only makes sense relative to a given reference frame, but that doesn't mean that time measurement is subjective (i.e. depending on a subject's opinion, or only true from the perspective of a conscious subject). "X time passed in reference frame Y" is an objective fact in relativity.
It may be helpful to think about a more mundane example. The results Google returns for a given search term depend on who searches, which makes them relative. But they don't depend on the feelings of the searcher and hence are objective, not subjective.
It may be helpful to think about a more mundane example. The results Google returns for a given search term depend on who searches, which makes them relative. But they don't depend on the feelings of the searcher and hence are objective, not subjective.
Google subjective and copy the definition you see here. Here's what I see:
subjective: based on or influenced by personal feelings, tastes, or opinions.
subjective: based on or influenced by personal feelings, tastes, or opinions.
First result is Wikipedia entry for "Subjectivity" which says...
- Something being a subject, narrowly meaning an individual who possesses conscious experiences, such as perspectives, feelings, beliefs, and desires.
- Something being a subject, broadly meaning an entity that has agency, meaning that it acts upon or wields power over some other entity (an object).
- Some information, idea, situation, or physical thing considered true only from the perspective of a subject or subjects.
The third being the only obvious applicable one.
It's also hypocritical to demand an adherence to an anti-common-sense physics-based formal definition of "time" while refusing the same courtesy towards formal definitions of "subjective."
- Something being a subject, narrowly meaning an individual who possesses conscious experiences, such as perspectives, feelings, beliefs, and desires.
- Something being a subject, broadly meaning an entity that has agency, meaning that it acts upon or wields power over some other entity (an object).
- Some information, idea, situation, or physical thing considered true only from the perspective of a subject or subjects.
The third being the only obvious applicable one.
It's also hypocritical to demand an adherence to an anti-common-sense physics-based formal definition of "time" while refusing the same courtesy towards formal definitions of "subjective."
But it's not applicable, because an "observer" in relativity is not a subject having perspectives, feelings, beliefs, etc. It is an abstract mathematical point moving through space. "Reference frame" is really the proper term, not observer or subject. And the proper time that passes in a given reference frame is an objective fact in relativity, even though that measurement cannot be directly applied to other reference frames without transformation.
"Objective" doesn't mean "experienced from all perspectives in the same way". Two different observers of a cube will get two different perspectives of the cube. The cube is still a single, objective, observer-independent reality. The same applies to relativistic time. It's a single reality (part of the spacetime manifold) that is measured differently in different reference frames. The different measurements must be consistent with one another according to a system of formulas. Just as different perspectives of a cube must be consistent with one another based on (1) the cube's objective existence in space and (2) the formulas of optics which determine the perspective each observer will receive.
It may be helpful to think about a more mundane example. Google search results for a given search term depend on who searches, which makes them relative. But they don't depend on the feelings of the searcher and hence are not subjective.
"Objective" doesn't mean "experienced from all perspectives in the same way". Two different observers of a cube will get two different perspectives of the cube. The cube is still a single, objective, observer-independent reality. The same applies to relativistic time. It's a single reality (part of the spacetime manifold) that is measured differently in different reference frames. The different measurements must be consistent with one another according to a system of formulas. Just as different perspectives of a cube must be consistent with one another based on (1) the cube's objective existence in space and (2) the formulas of optics which determine the perspective each observer will receive.
It may be helpful to think about a more mundane example. Google search results for a given search term depend on who searches, which makes them relative. But they don't depend on the feelings of the searcher and hence are not subjective.
Love your last line after reading Napoleon Changon on cultural anthropology in the 1960s to 1990s. What a fight he had.
I would agree that cultural anthropology could benefit from an objective lens as well ;)
I just read a review of his "Noble Savages" book in the NYT and it's one of the worst things I've ever read. The author said almost nothing about the book and spent the entire time gossiping about the author, occasionally backing the gossip with tiny snippets of the authors' writing.
This one was somewhat better; https://www.npr.org/2013/02/16/171918973/noble-savages-a-jou...
I just read a review of his "Noble Savages" book in the NYT and it's one of the worst things I've ever read. The author said almost nothing about the book and spent the entire time gossiping about the author, occasionally backing the gossip with tiny snippets of the authors' writing.
This one was somewhat better; https://www.npr.org/2013/02/16/171918973/noble-savages-a-jou...
Time may not be absolute, but calling gravity subjective is safer (after all, the arrow of time seems to be very much part of nature). However, I bet you still feel squeamish about jumping from anything higher than a meter.
> (after all, the arrow of time seems to be very much part of nature)
Rovelli has much to say about the Second Law and entropy:
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6rWqJhDv7M
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Order_of_Time_(book)
Rovelli has much to say about the Second Law and entropy:
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6rWqJhDv7M
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Order_of_Time_(book)
how can you tell whether something is part of "nature" or just part of our nature?
There seems to be a bizarre race in the contemporary discourse: what else can have a "colonial" sticker put on?
IDK if people derive some prestige from outdoing one another in this regard.
IDK if people derive some prestige from outdoing one another in this regard.
I think they absolutely do. There are certainly specific places online(and in real world too) where your societal standing is entirely dependent on how outraged you are, or what new sources of oppression you can identify each week. Bonus points for thinking of ones no one has yet accused of anything - like time!
"In reality, this process had already been taking place throughout the 1800s as a result of European colonialism, imperialism and oppression. Colonialism was not just a conquest of land, and therefore space, but also a conquest of time. "
Just poetry.
"In reality, this process had already been taking place throughout the 1800s as a result of European colonialism, imperialism and oppression. Colonialism was not just a conquest of land, and therefore space, but also a conquest of time. "
Just poetry.
Not my favourite Twitter account, but if you like that kind of thing here's a long list of examples https://twitter.com/titaniamcgrath/status/128102400679206092...
White man trope vs. noble savages is just that, a trope. The point was elsewhere, that we synchronize our whole lives to an artificial clock, is that absolutely necessary?
For example, is is known that teenagers would have health benefits from later school start time but it's almost impossible to implement that due to rigid clocks of everybody else. In fact, everyone would benefit from a good sleep.
For example, is is known that teenagers would have health benefits from later school start time but it's almost impossible to implement that due to rigid clocks of everybody else. In fact, everyone would benefit from a good sleep.
> For example, is is known that teenagers would have health benefits from later school start time but it's almost impossible to implement that due to rigid clocks of everybody else.
It absolutely has nothing to do with that. It has everything to do with people essentially not believing that it actually matters. And to some extent due to convenience for parents who drive their kids to school.
My local school system does have high school students starting late relative to elementary schools.
It absolutely has nothing to do with that. It has everything to do with people essentially not believing that it actually matters. And to some extent due to convenience for parents who drive their kids to school.
My local school system does have high school students starting late relative to elementary schools.
> For example, is is known that teenagers would have health benefits from later school start time
Our school district did that this year. You know what happened? Teenagers stayed up later, either by choice or obligations, and got the same hours of sleep before, only now some of them can't hold afterschool jobs because they get out of school too late to fit homework and employment in.
Everyone is looking forward to reverting the change next year.
Our school district did that this year. You know what happened? Teenagers stayed up later, either by choice or obligations, and got the same hours of sleep before, only now some of them can't hold afterschool jobs because they get out of school too late to fit homework and employment in.
Everyone is looking forward to reverting the change next year.
> is that absolutely necessary?
When you go to a store, do you expect to know if it's open beforehand or getting there and finding it closed at random is ok?
When you go to a store, do you expect to know if it's open beforehand or getting there and finding it closed at random is ok?
I frequently go to stores that are open at the convenience of the owner. Often this is out in the country, but there's even one storefront near me in NYC that proudly says, "open by appointment and by luck". You quickly get used to the human-scale patterns.
Once when I was in Munich I needed medicine on a Sunday. Despite the pharmacy's posted hours stating it would be closed, I was somehow able to raise the pharmacist and get the medicine I needed. I was very grateful that day to have a human in the loop.
I hardly think store opening hours are a good argument for the "absolute necessity" of supreme rule of the wall clock.
Once when I was in Munich I needed medicine on a Sunday. Despite the pharmacy's posted hours stating it would be closed, I was somehow able to raise the pharmacist and get the medicine I needed. I was very grateful that day to have a human in the loop.
I hardly think store opening hours are a good argument for the "absolute necessity" of supreme rule of the wall clock.
That need exists, but clocks aren't the only way to solve the problem. This is HN after all. Disrupt time. Sell store availability as a service. APIify that shit!
I can honestly say that in Dundas, Ontario that is my experience. My life has not suffered for it.
Should be we optimizing society for the education of our youth or our shopping convenience?
When your kids go to their school, do you expect the teacher and classmates to be there too?
It runs through all aspects of society.
It runs through all aspects of society.
These are not mutually exclusive.
Schools still need clocks to coordinate regardless of what time they start.
Schools still need clocks to coordinate regardless of what time they start.
If you want to get a sense for where the author is coming from, I would refer you to the many stories of Amazon workers who pee in bottles because the clock-based schedule imposed by their employer apparently does not permit even the flexibility for universal bodily functions.
Depending on a where a driver is on their route, taking a piss might be 2-minute pop into a fast food bathroom, or a 20-minute diversion to find a bathroom. This is a good example of how important and basic human experiences don’t conform to the idea of universal and repeatable time increments that can be bolted together to make schedules.
Instead of the schedule accommodating the person, the person must accommodate the schedule. This is what the author means when they say the clock creates time.
One of the ways we measure power in society is the ability to resist this. The Amazon driver has to pee in a bottle to keep their job. But everyone has to wait for the CEO if they need the bathroom between meetings.
Depending on a where a driver is on their route, taking a piss might be 2-minute pop into a fast food bathroom, or a 20-minute diversion to find a bathroom. This is a good example of how important and basic human experiences don’t conform to the idea of universal and repeatable time increments that can be bolted together to make schedules.
Instead of the schedule accommodating the person, the person must accommodate the schedule. This is what the author means when they say the clock creates time.
One of the ways we measure power in society is the ability to resist this. The Amazon driver has to pee in a bottle to keep their job. But everyone has to wait for the CEO if they need the bathroom between meetings.
That’s about control, not time.
Plenty of soldiers, laborers and miners shit their pants on duty because of the controls placed upon them. That has nothing to do with time or clocks.
Plenty of soldiers, laborers and miners shit their pants on duty because of the controls placed upon them. That has nothing to do with time or clocks.
You'd get the same things in ancient slave labor long before clocks were invented. It's not about time or clocks, it's about exploitation.
There have been a lot of perspectives on time through human history.
The Mayans were very gifted astronomers, and built their temples such that the sun would shine exactly through a small portal at the top of the temple on the equinoxes. Christian basilicas and Jewish temples had similar timekeeping functions.
The Greek and Roman pagans saw time as turbulent and cyclical, subject to the caprice of the gods.
The pre-modern, Christian worldview saw time as a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end, but also as a vertically-structured fractal of cycles within cycles, and our orientation within was ascending upwards to an eternity outside time and space.
The Protestant fathers saw the linear progression of time forwards towards salvation as the true content of the gospel — that our orientation is forwards, towards the future.
Some Maori saw our orientation in time as backwards, that we walk with our back towards the impenetrable future, with the past visible in front of us.
None of these, however, saw time as an infinitely critiqueable, totally relative social construct with no given reality outside of humanly mutable, intersubjective power relations. This makes the author of the article, in my sincere opinion, the “whitest” of them all.
The Mayans were very gifted astronomers, and built their temples such that the sun would shine exactly through a small portal at the top of the temple on the equinoxes. Christian basilicas and Jewish temples had similar timekeeping functions.
The Greek and Roman pagans saw time as turbulent and cyclical, subject to the caprice of the gods.
The pre-modern, Christian worldview saw time as a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end, but also as a vertically-structured fractal of cycles within cycles, and our orientation within was ascending upwards to an eternity outside time and space.
The Protestant fathers saw the linear progression of time forwards towards salvation as the true content of the gospel — that our orientation is forwards, towards the future.
Some Maori saw our orientation in time as backwards, that we walk with our back towards the impenetrable future, with the past visible in front of us.
None of these, however, saw time as an infinitely critiqueable, totally relative social construct with no given reality outside of humanly mutable, intersubjective power relations. This makes the author of the article, in my sincere opinion, the “whitest” of them all.
Yep. The article is apparently ignorant of the long history of sophisticated clocks in non-Western countries (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_timekeeping_devices)
The author is absolutely correct in claiming that the *importance* of time in a culture is... cultural.
Timezones and DST are especially politically sensitive. See: https://blog.poormansmath.net/the-time-it-takes-to-change-th...
Same for the ideas around what is a reasonable time to sleep, eat, work. There are all sort of biases for/against early risers and owls across different societies.
Sounds like you and the other commenters might have an axe to grind here.
Timezones and DST are especially politically sensitive. See: https://blog.poormansmath.net/the-time-it-takes-to-change-th...
Same for the ideas around what is a reasonable time to sleep, eat, work. There are all sort of biases for/against early risers and owls across different societies.
Sounds like you and the other commenters might have an axe to grind here.
Tinezones are a great example. Why should zones be moulded to fit any geographic or political boundaries? Surely time is above petty human inventions like national borders. If time was a permanent unyielding fact this shouldn't be possible. Yet we bend time when it's convenient by reshaping the zones by which time operates.
We bend clocks, not time. We bend them for convenience and it has nothing to do with whether time is an “unyielding fact”.
There is no time outside of our ability to measure it. Every such measuring device is a clock. Separating the two is a pointless reification of time.
Of course time exists. Measurement does not create a thing. It quantifies it.
Time exists regardless of measurement, just like mass, volume, voltage, etc.
If time did not exist outside of measurement we would have no reason to measure it. We created clocks (and other devices) to measure the passage of time, but we were well aware of its passage before we measured it.
Time exists regardless of measurement, just like mass, volume, voltage, etc.
If time did not exist outside of measurement we would have no reason to measure it. We created clocks (and other devices) to measure the passage of time, but we were well aware of its passage before we measured it.
Our awareness of such events is itself a quantification. Just as we can estimate distance we can measure with more refined instruments. The same applies to all physical quantities.
I am completely lost as to what your point is. Do you believe that mass also does not exist unless we measure it or are you saying there is something special about time?
I'm making the radical constructionist point based on Berger and Luckmann's The Social Construction of Reality.
I asked a pretty straightforward question that shouldn’t require me reading hundreds of pages for you to answer.
I feel like this is headed toward a low-value philosophical discussion about how nothing really means anything without an observer or something like that.
I feel like this is headed toward a low-value philosophical discussion about how nothing really means anything without an observer or something like that.
Nearly all knowledge is socially constructed and appears as though it isn't through the process of reification. This is different from the realism-idealism divide.
That is about as simple as I can make it. It is probably just as useful as saying a spinor is a square root of a vector. While simple, it doesn't do much to illustrate the point. A background in constructionism can however be had at the expense of reading 189 pages.
That is about as simple as I can make it. It is probably just as useful as saying a spinor is a square root of a vector. While simple, it doesn't do much to illustrate the point. A background in constructionism can however be had at the expense of reading 189 pages.
The physical reality of time is limited to the concept of time differences - how much time elapses between two events.
On the other hand, the notion of assigning a particular label (e.g. "9 o'clock" to some moment of time) is arbitrary and determined by social consensus or political aspects, physical reality plays little role in that.
On the other hand, the notion of assigning a particular label (e.g. "9 o'clock" to some moment of time) is arbitrary and determined by social consensus or political aspects, physical reality plays little role in that.
It's also a Kafka Trap, where any attempt to disagree with the premise can be blamed on "white fragility".
Try to steelman this: the reification of the construct of time makes it appear as an independent objective object.
If there were only multiverses where people could go live out their fantasies. This author could go live in a world where the inhabitants don’t measure time. There probably wouldn’t be much scientific progress, but at least they get to live the reap the life they sowed.
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Time is objective? The measurement of time is objective but the feeling of time is not.
Did you just assume my acceleration?
O clock, how ye astounds. As the fourth hour striketh I am unabashedly reminded of his whiteness; wherefrom dost thou find such disregard for aboriginal astronomy?
— Plautus (c.254-184 BC)