What time is it?

The other day I started writing a postcard to an old friend. This is a friend of mine who I met in 1974! Geeeezuuuzzzz! That’s over 30 years ago now!

So, I started writing this card and I was wondering about the nature of time. Not knowing how all those years could pass by seemingly so quickly, I was just aimlessly speculating with this person about whether or not time could be considered in something other than the abstract. There’s all this terminology which makes reference to time as something more concrete than the reality of this shapeless, formless principle which rules our lives.

It’s one of the things rolling around in my head, I’ve always gone up to people older than myself and asked them how they perceive the passage of time and it’s interesting how rapidly the days get progressively the older one gets. When you’re a child and have logged so few hours to measure your life against, each new day is a gigantic marker, months are an eternity and the years, eons.

Now, middle aged, the days pass by like signposts along a highway at 50 miles per hour. I can only imagine how the EYOC perceives these things.

So, the other night I happened to be in the car driving home and I heard this show. - [real player required]

Einstein’s Theory of Relativity may have implications on the concept of choice. Namely, that there is none. Do we choose what movie to see tonight? No. (It’s already been chosen, some say.) Do we choose to wiggle our finger? No. (Already wiggled.) This hour of Radio Lab features conversations with scientists and an entire cast of characters who are all waging battle against time – or at least the common sense view of time. We’ll visit a particle accelerator where scientists recreate the moment just after the beginning of time… and also a Dublin artist whose life is a 19 century time-experiment. We end in the Mojave desert, where geologic time flows like a frozen hourglass.

It was an amazing bit of synchronicity and a very enjoyable listen if you have (of course) the time.