Time As A Dominant Mode

I often wonder if time is just an illusion. A distraction that keeps us on our toes. Keeps us waiting.

Time, what is time, and why is it important? Well time is a concept that humans’ brains can perceive, in fact their brains basically construct the past, the present, and the future. Basically, time is a measurement system, and without it the human race wouldn’t have ever existed. Humans have a very simple understanding of time, and they still do not understand its full potential. Humans only understand the measurement of time, and the manipulation and capturing of time overwhelms them. To this day the only way humans have captured time is their memory, and even then they still get it wrong sometimes.

Time and the Conways (1937) and A Dream Play (1901) play with the idea of time as nonlinear. Influenced by John William Dunne, Priestley begins to investigate his own conception of time as the past, present, and future all happening at once. Strindberg, although he wrote A Dream Play ahead of Dunne and Priestley, also expounds on similar ideas linking time and dreams. Dreams can free us from viewing time’s structure as fixed and linear. Therefore, both playwrights begin to make theatre audiences aware of new ideas about how to perceive time and the use of dreams/precognitive states. Utilizing Dunne’s basic theory of non-linear time, I will talk about how we can apply this to readings of Time and the Conways and A Dream Play to explore themes of dreams and perception of time.

Throughout the course of the film “In Time”, the truth in relation to social class and identity are represented by Marxist and Psychoanalytic theories are: the distinct disconnections that time creates between the lower class and upper class, and the ability to self-express one’s feelings is consumed by time, as it is both currency and needed for survival. In the film, time is not represented as money, rather it replaced it. But it still creates the same or bigger disconnection between the social classes as money does in our society.

Through both Hingston’s writing and Levy’s writing we have discussed the matter of time. Both authors wrote on completely different subjects, but at the base of the piece was time. Time is always changing and no matter who, what, or where you are it affects you. And we need to change to keep up with these changing times.

Time is a free force and is said to be eternal. Time is a concept that is said to be perceived by the individual. Time is what moves on, allowing one to grow and reach their peak and achieve happiness in life. Experience and knowledge allow us to transcend ourselves in a different time. Different people view time in different aspects, whether it truly exits, whether it is meaningless or whether it exits beyond our lives. In the novel Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse, time is conceptualized as meaningless, while in Hemon’s article “If God Existed, He Would Be A Solid Midfielder”, time is posited as a “snapshot” that is meaningful and valuable.

Time is one of the most important concepts to human beings. Calendars, which are organized fragments of time separated in to days, months and years allow us to keep track of our daily activities. Calendars are similar to the basic necessities of life such as food and water. It is an essential factor that dictates how we live our everyday lives. Without time being interpreted through the means of calendars we would believe that time would be infinite thus, rendering our lives meaningless.

“Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.” This humorous quote from Douglas Adams’ book The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy illustrates how complex and fraught with contradiction the subject of human time perception is. (Adams, 1979) Time is a much discussed and often romanticized concept. We have many different ways we describe the phenomenon of time, ranging from passive to active perception. Our study of time perception is often separated into 2 separate areas; Time as a concrete law, a measurement of existence that will continue regardless of human interaction with it, or a fluid concept, a feeling about our existence that is directly related to our experience. Time as a concrete law says that radioactive molecules will decay at a constant rate so the passage of time is quantifiable and fixed, we can program a clock to a preset algorithm according to that rate of that decay, and it will keep the same time, regardless of the attention we pay to it. Time as a fluid concept tells us that it is relative, moving at different rates according to our feelings and experiences, the time of a clock changes depending on where on the earth that clock is located, time is viewed as a societal construct, directly related to the activities of humans. The human perception of time is a combination of both the concrete and fluid, humans innately sense time as real and quantifiable but we don’t always perceive it in the same way or as moving at the same rate.

We have expressions which refer to the idea that we may experience time as subjectively happening at different speeds. For example, "A watched pot never boils." But, we generally take the view that, objectively, an hour is an hour is an hour and all things move forward at the same pace.

Time is a unit of measurement used to describe the progression of events. It is a set notion that has limits and is known to be unwavering, meaning it cannot be distorted. Time can be measured in set intervals which helps it to remain unchanging, yet I beg to differ. Time has the tendency to pass at various different rates depending upon the situation at hand. It may seem to stand still or to pass in with a blink of an eye. Scientifically it is a fixed measurement, but in reality time passes as it pleases. A lot can happen in a second. Here is my story of how a couple of seconds gave me realization that nearly anything can change in an instant.

When I was in standard 6th, I was introduced to some basic scientific theories like gravitation and force. Since then I have been very curious to learn more about them and when I studied them further I wondered how Newton came to the conclusion that force is equal to mass into acceleration. We know that acceleration is dv/dt, the first derivative of velocity with respect to time. But what is time? Is it more than seconds or minutes or even hours? Since the definition of time is duration and duration is just the passage of time, so the curiosity to know exactly what time is entranced my interest in Physics. Due to some of the family circumstances I wasn’t able to accomplish my dream. in Physics but when I enrolled myself in Philosophy Honors. course at Miranda House , University of Delhi , I saw a ray of hope about my dream to study theories related to What Time is.

Andy Warhol once wrote a poem about time. “About Time. From time to time. Do time. Time yourself. Weekends. In time. In no time. In good time. Between time. Time and again. Lifetime. Time-worn. Pass time. Mark time. Buy time. Keep time. On time. In time. Time off. Time out. Time in. Time card. Time lapse. Time zone. The beforetime. The meantime. The aftertime. The All-time.”¹ However different the actions of these phrases may imply, they are all congruent under one conceptual factor: time. The measurement of existence is based on the past, present and future. The residue of existence is art. Art is a product of time. Deliberate or not, time in artists’ work play a role in the making through process, narration, materials and motion.

Throughout its history, mankind has doubtless proved its obsession with innovation. Inventions, especially those of concrete nature, have purposes majorly fixed on increasing efficiency. Conversely, many of mankind’s abstract inventions, such as the myths of classical Greece, have purposes more intent on satiating the curiosities of and providing comfort to mankind. An interesting mixture of both of these types of invention is time. More specifically, how the effects of culture and an individual’s personal experiences affect perception and attitude toward time.

Time is the existence or events in the past, present, and future. It’s different for each person, culture and around the world. For me, time is the most important thing about time is when it comes to family. Family is the most important thing in the world, I don’t know how long I will have time with them because they can go away and won’t see each other anymore. An example, of when time influences me is when I visited my grandma in Mexico. Spending time with my grandma was the best thing in my life because I never get to see her. Laughing and interacting with her was amazing because I hardly time to be with her because she lives far. Both of my parents, believe time is important. Each of them always go and visit other family members to spend time with them and hang out. When my grandma visits, she always talks about the old memories of what she went through and about my dad. Time for her is fading and she recalls memories to just let time pass.

It is paradoxical to have a course, which revolves round the corrosiveness of faulted Western notions of time and its depiction through abstraction, identify itself with an abstract title but argue for the concreteness and tangibility of the portrayal of time and space. A Place Beyond Time does just that. Containing a vastly abstract title, A Place Beyond Time may at first glance appear to properly relate time as a tangent notion with space. Upon further contemplation, however, it becomes patent that A Place Beyond Time possesses a conspicuous absence present in its philosophy of aloofness from intangibility. And although the name of the course attempts to tackle and manifest the complications of abstract and concrete time, it is through its lack of definition and precision, lack of possession, and lack of sensation of repetition that A Place Beyond Time fails to properly capitalize on this dilemma.