08 August 2005

It's About Time

Now that I created my blog, WorldWideWolfe, what do I say? Do I really have anything to say? Does it matter either way?

Thus, I have decided to pick one of the most difficult of all topics to begin my rants and raves--TIME. For many this is easy and simplistic: a. Time marches on.; b. What time is it?; c. Well, it is years, days, hours, minutes, and seconds.; and d. Stupid, it is a magazine that I subscribe to. Most people have a simple-minded idea of time (or just about everything) because they never have to think about time as long as they have time remaining—the clock is ticking down for all of us.

The understanding of time is one of those things, like most things, that fit into my Onion Worldly View, OWV. Just about everything in our world is like an onion. For those unfamiliar with onions, they are composed of many layers. Peal a layer of onion from the onion and you will find another. If you continue for hours, assuming that you are patient and do not mind a little crying, you will continue to find layers under layers. I think you get the point. Most people for just about everything only understand and comprehend the first layer of the onion. This can be with something abstract like time or it can be cars, football, or anything.

What do most know about cars? It goes like this for first-level onion people: add gas, start car, put it into the proper gear, press one pedal to go, and the other to stop—end of story. Contrast this knowledge to the automotive engineer who has a Ph. D. degree from MIT and 40 years of experience designing and modifying cars for a major car manufacturer. What level of the onion has he/she reached?

With that out of the way I contend that we have to consider that most of us are either at the first or second layer of the onion when it comes to our understanding of time. For example, many of us know that time is relative. What does that mean? It means that time depends on the speed that we are moving and where we are located, our frame of reference. Do not accept what I say but time slows when we approach the speed of light (c = 3e8 m/s or 186,000 miles/s). Yes, if you could see the dashboard clock of one who passes us at the speed of light, it would be ticking slower than our clock. Do we have evidence of this? The answer is emphatically yes. Do you understand what this means? Your time is not necessarily the time for someone else.

What about people who live on the other side of the earth? I just returned from China which is 12 hours ahead of Eastern Daylight Savings Time, EDT. They live in the future and you live in their past. Just think about that for awhile. My flight from Hong Kong to Newark was time travel. Those going to the west coast of the US from eastern Asia arrive before they leave.

Even more astounding to me is the perception of time. When I was young an old and wise lady that I loved and respected told me that as I grew older time would go faster. How can that be? Time is time. Did I just contradict myself? Now that I have lived over 50 years since hearing her tell me this tidbit of knowledge, I know she was correct. Now that I am 61 years old, time is flying by just like the scenery I viewed outside of the window of the TGV bullet train that took me at 175 mi/hr from Paris to Avignon. When I was young the scenery passed as slowly when I rode my bike to junior high school—Garrison Junior High School, Baltimore, Maryland.

While I still do not have any conclusive ideas that explain our perception of time, a wiser person than me suggests that time is perceived as a percent of the amount of time you have been allotted. An hour to a five year old is a much larger percent of their life (large percent) than mine having survived 61 years in the best of all possible worlds.

Check out the following links:

Time Travel

Perception of Time

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