{"id":1604,"date":"2014-10-27T10:44:27","date_gmt":"2014-10-27T17:44:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/independentlens\/blog\/?p=5985"},"modified":"2023-08-02T13:04:53","modified_gmt":"2023-08-02T20:04:53","slug":"time-brakeless","status":"publish","type":"blog","link":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/independentlens\/blog\/time-brakeless\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Time Itself Brakeless?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Nature of Time<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u201cI know this much: that there is objective time, but also subjective time, the kind you wear on the inside of your wrist, next to where the pulse lies. And this personal time, which is the true time, is measured in your relationship to memory.\u201d \u2015 Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

One of the overriding themes throughout Kyoko Miyake<\/a>\u2019s film Brakeless\u00a0(<\/i>which premieres on Independent Lens<\/em> on PBS tonight, October 27 at 10pm [check local listings<\/a>] and was called a “beautiful, philosophical documentary” in the LA Times<\/a><\/em>) is modern societal pressure around time, an\u00a0obsession with punctuality and schedules.<\/p>\n

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The Amagasaki train crash<\/a>, as the film explores, centered around the driver trying to make up for an 80 second delay, clearly a minimal amount under most circumstances, yet to the stressed-out driver hired by West Japan Railway, it was an unacceptable gap.<\/p>\n

And to the survivors of the accident, the crash itself seemed to exist in suspended animation, an eternity that also existed in a blink. Even though the crash lasted only mere seconds, one survivor remembers distinctly that they\u00a0“could see the houses sliding away until only blue sky was left.” Does time flow differently at different moments for different people?<\/p>\n

For that matter, why\u00a0does time seem to move fast as we get older?\u00a0Why do some days seem to crawl while others go too fast? (\u201cTime flies when you’re having fun\u201d is a favorite expression \u2014 but does it?)\u00a0Are there triggers in culture that can affect how we experience the passage of time? Composer Jonathan Berger says “yes,” basically, in \u201cHow Music Hijacks Our Perception of Time<\/a>\u201d:<\/p>\n

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The human brain, we have learned, adjusts and recalibrates temporal perception. Our ability to encode and decode sequential information, to integrate and segregate simultaneous signals, is fundamental to human survival. It allows us to find our place in, and navigate, our physical world. But music also demonstrates that time perception is inherently subjective\u2014and an integral part of our lives. \u201cFor the time element in music is single,\u201d wrote Thomas Mann in his novel, The\u00a0<\/i>Magic Mountain<\/i>. \u201cInto a section of mortal time music pours itself, thereby inexpressibly enhancing and ennobling what it fills.\u201d<\/p>\n

In recent years, numerous studies have shown how music hijacks our relationship with everyday time. For instance, more drinks are sold in bars when with slow-tempo music, which seems to make the bar a more enjoyable environment, one in which patrons want to linger\u2014and order another round.\u00a0<\/b><\/span>\u00a0Similarly, consumers spend 38 percent more time in the grocery store when the background music is slow.\u00a0Familiarity is also a factor. Shoppers perceive longer shopping times when they are familiar with the background music in the store, but actually spend more time shopping when the music is novel.\u00a0Novel music is perceived as more pleasurable, making the time seem to pass quicker, and so shoppers stay in the stores longer than they may imagine.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the clearest evidence of musical hijacking is this: In 2004, the Royal Automobile Club Foundation for Motoring deemed Wagner\u2019s Ride of the Valkyrie<\/i> the most dangerous music to listen to while driving. It is not so much the distraction, but the substitution of the frenzied tempo of the music that challenges drivers\u2019 normal sense of speed\u2014and the objective cue of the speedometer\u2014and causes them to speed.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Down-slipping time, sweet, swift, and shallow stream,
\nHere, like a boulder, lies this afternoon
\nAcross your eager flow. So you shall stay,
\nDeepened and dammed, to let me breathe and be.<\/span> –Christopher Morley<\/p>\n

Time is Money?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a surprising element that can distort people\u2019s perception of time: one\u2019s financial situation<\/strong>, having money or not having money. As noted in this piece in The Atlantic<\/em><\/a>, power is not only \u201cthe ultimate aphrodisiac,\u201d it may be a time-enhancer.<\/p>\n

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A new study<\/a><\/span> out of the University of California at Berkeley examined how the perception of time can be distorted by being in a position of power. With the help of hundreds of people, the study\u2019s authors found that the more power people have, the more time they feel they have available in their lives. The researchers primed some subjects for feelings of either power or powerlessness by assigning them to the role of either boss or employee in a mock task of solving brain teasers. The bosses were told they’d be making decisions about which puzzles to solve and how to divvy up the highly-sought-after candy prize at the end of the exercise. Once primed, the subjects filled out surveys that revealed their perceptions of time availability…<\/p>\n

The Berkeley study concluded that an increase in the perception of available time leads powerful people to be, on the whole, less stressed. The flip side of this is that the powerless feel the pressure of time\u2019s inexorable march, and research has found<\/a> that poverty-related concerns like being short on time can lead people to make worse decisions.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Time on Our Minds<\/strong><\/p>\n

From the World Science Festival<\/a>, “Is the Passage of Time Just an Illusion?”<\/p>\n