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Do you believe in climate change?

This may seem like an odd question for a climate scientist to ask, but it is one I am constantly asked now. The typical discussion starts: «I know that the climate is changing, but hasn’t it always changed through natural cycles?» Then they will often give an example, such as the medieval warm period to prove their point.

Those asking the question include a wide range of people I meet in the pub, friends, politicians and, increasingly, even some of those active in sustainable development and the renewable energy businesses. What I find interesting is that I have known many of these people for a long time and they never asked me this before.

Recent studies show that public acceptance of the scientific evidence for man-made climate change has decreased. However, the change is not that great. The difference I find in talking to people is that they feel better able to express their doubts.

This is very hard for scientists to understand. The scientific evidence that humanity is having an effect on the climate is overwhelming and increasing every year. Yet public perception of this is confused. People modify their beliefs about uncomfortable truth, they may have become bored of constantly hearing about climate change; or external factors such as the financial crisis may have played a role.

Around three years ago, I raised the issue of the way that science can be misused. In some cases scare stories in the media were over-hyping climate change, and I think we are paying the price for this now with a reaction the other way. I was concerned then that science is not always presented objectively by the media. What I don’t think any of us appreciated at the time was the depth of disconnect between the scientific process and the public.

You can see research by the Met Office that shows the evidence of man-made warming is even stronger than it was when the last report was published. A whole range of different datasets and independent analyses show the world is warming. There is a broad consensus that over the last half-century, warming has been rapid, and man-made greenhouse gas emissions are very likely to be the cause.

Ultimately, as the planet continues to warm, the issue of whether you believe in climate change will become more and more irrelevant. We will all experience the impacts of climate change in some way, so the evidence will be there in plain sight.

The more appropriate questions for today are how will our climate change and how can we prepare for those changes? That’s why it’s important that climate scientists continue their work, and continue sharing their evidence and research so people can stay up to date – and make up their own minds.

What Einstein Meant By «Time is an Illusion»

There are all sorts of quotes about time. One of my favorite quotes is by Abhijit Naskar, the author of «Love, God & Neurons: Memoir of a scientist who found himself by getting lost.» He said, “Time is basically an illusion created by the mind to aid in our sense of temporal presence in the vast ocean of space. Without the neurons to create a virtual perception of the past and the future based on all our experiences, there is no actual existence of the past and the future. All that there is, is the present.”

One of the most influential physicists to have ever lived, Albert Einstein, shared this view, writing, » People like us who believe in physics know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.» In other words, time is an illusion.

When you think about it, it makes sense that time is an arbitrary construct — it’s our way of making sense of growing up and growing old while the world changes around us. It’s not all that hokey. So let’s look at how our perception of time changes in different locations.

It’s All Relative:

According to Einstein’s own theories, time moves differently for someone below sea level than for someone situated on the highest peaks on the planet (according to some studies, «at sea level you age one-billionth of a second less every year than you would if you lived on top of Mt. Everest.»). This is due to a phenomenon posited by general relativity called gravitational time dilation.

The logic behind gravitational time dilation is fairly simple: Objects with a lot of mass create a strong gravitational field. This gravitational field noticeably warps the fabric of spacetime around these objects, producing what we know as gravity. When a stream of light particles passes by an object with sufficient gravity, the stream of photons traveling at the speed of light would appear to bend.

What’s even more interesting is that mass can warp the very fabric of time itself, causing it to move slower or faster depending on how massive the object is, and how strong the object’s gravitational pull is, which is where time dilation really becomes wonky to us.

An astronaut venturing into a black hole. Source: NASA [astronaut]; NASA/ESA and G. Bacon, STScI [black hole illustration]

It should be noted, however, that an observer in the strong gravity experiences time as running normally. It is only in relation to a reference frame with weaker gravity that time runs slowly.

To a person in strong gravity, time appears to pass normally, while a clock in weak gravity runs fast. While to the person in weak gravity, the clock appears to run normally and the clock in strong gravity runs slowly. Of course, there is nothing wrong with the clocks. Time itself is slowing down and speeding up because of the relativistic way in which mass warps space and time.

The faster one moves, the slower time passes in relation to a static observer’s perception. Matter traveling at the speed of light does not really experience time or distance, at least relative to a static point. Just watching a spaceship drift off into deep space, the people on Earth view the ship as moving much more slowly through space and time than the people on the ship perceive it to be moving. Crew members would also age at a slower rate, the faster they move.

Making Time Dilation Easy:

Take another cool example: The movie «Interstellar» in which time dilation is demonstrated (spoilers beyond, obviously). In the movie, a crew leaves Earth in search of a habitable planet we could flee a dying Earth for. At one point in the film, a few crew members land on a water world located not too far from a gargantuan black hole/wormhole. Given the proximity to the super-dense stellar object, the planet experiences unimaginably volatile waves, and the time dilation becomes extreme. One hour on the surface was equal to 7 years for someone beyond the black hole’s orbit.

Astronauts on the ISS experience a much less dramatic form of time dilation, given the International Space Station is not traveling anywhere near relativistic speeds. Two twin astronauts were part of an experiment conducted by NASA; they calculated that the twin who spent the most time in space actually aged 5 milliseconds more than his Earth-bound twin.

It Gets Even Weirder:

Perhaps the strangest example of time dilation can be seen in and around black holes. Time ticks much differently the closer you get to the event horizon of a black hole. Imagine that you had two clocks — one held by an observer beyond the immensely strong gravity of the object, and another held by an observer passing near the event horizon — the clock farther away would tick faster than the one close to the event horizon.

From the point of view of the observer near the event horizon, one day may have passed, while the person observing from the outside may have experienced a decade of time. Eventually, time may appear to stop altogether for the observer near the event horizon.

From the outside, the observer at the event horizon would begin to redshift, which means the wavelength of light they emit would move toward the red portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, until the light becomes dimmer and dimmer. Inevitably, time would appear to stop altogether before the observer plunges into the event horizon. In theory, we would never actually see this occur, as the object would appear to freeze and never actually disappear from sight into the black hole.

Black holes can be formed when a massive star reaches the end of its life, its core begins to collapse in on itself, spitting out large quantities of gas and dust in a supernova event. The star must be at least three times as massive as our Sun in order for this process to occur. It is thought that supermassive black holes, which range from 100,000 to tens of billions of times the mass of the Sun, may be formed by a sort of chain reaction, and this is where extreme time dilation comes in.

Devoured By a Big Ole Black Hole:

If you’re wondering what actually happens when something finally gets sucked into the event horizon — the point at which nothing, not even photons (or light itself) can travel faster than the object’s escape velocity, thus there’s no chance of escaping its grasp — the physics gets rather convoluted and our understanding of how things work begins to fall apart.

It’s believed that an observer inside a black hole would eventually stop experiencing time altogether, but they would become stretched out as the black hole slowly ripped them apart — atom by atom. This is called spaghettification, The forces of gravity during a so-called «tidal disruption event» would pull harder on your head vs. your feet, and you’d be shredded.

Artist rendering of a star undergoing spaghettification as it’s devoured by a supermassive black hole during a so-called ‘tidal disruption event.’ Source: ESO/M. Kornmesser

Thankfully, we can sometimes measure these events, at least when they happen to other stellar objects. This is because they produce a lot of energy we can detect using specialized telescopes, like the ESO. Often gas and dust obscure our view, but if we catch an event at the right time, we can study just what happens when matter is devoured by a supermassive black hole.

As For Einstein.

As we saw from Einstein’s quote, he believed that time is an illusion, that both the future and the past are unchangeable, and will play out exactly the way they were meant to.

Many physicists share this view, but there are some that have alternate explanations for the way things will play out in the long run. One suggests that the present, future, and past are still mostly unwritten. Or, they are all playing out at the exact same time. The Block Universe Theory contributes a lot to these ideals.

Overall, do you think Einstein was right or wrong?

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Science in the News

Opening the lines of communication between research scientists and the wider community

No, It’s Not Just You: Why time “speeds up” as we get older

How a clock measures time and how you perceive it are quite different. As we grow older, it can often feel like time goes by faster and faster. This speeding up of subjective time with age is well documented by psychologists, but there is no consensus on the cause. In a paper published this month, Professor Adrian Bejan presents an argument based on the physics of neural signal processing. He hypothesizes that, over time, the rate at which we process visual information slows down, and this is what makes time ‘speed up’ as we grow older.

As we age, he argues, the size and complexity of the networks of neurons in our brains increases – electrical signals must traverse greater distances and thus signal processing takes more time. Moreover, ageing causes our nerves to accumulate damage that provides resistance to the flow of electric signals, further slowing processing time. Focusing on visual perception, Bejan posits that slower processing times result in us perceiving fewer ‘frames-per-second’ – more actual time passes between the perception of each new mental image. This is what leads to time passing more rapidly.When we are young, each second of actual time is packed with many more mental images. Like a slow-motion camera that captures thousands of images per second, time appears to pass more slowly.

As he puts it: “People are often amazed at how much they remember from days that seemed to last forever in their youth. It’s not that their experiences were much deeper or more meaningful, it’s just that they were being processed in rapid fire.”

Bejan’s argument is intuitive and based on simple principles of physics and biology. As such, it is a compelling explanation for this common phenomenon. However, it is not the only explanation out there, and so a more rigorous experimental approach may be required before this mystery is solved for good.

Managing Correspondent: Rory Maizels

Original article: Why the Days Seem Shorter as We Get Older – European Review

Image Credit: Aron Visuals

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170 thoughts on “ No, It’s Not Just You: Why time “speeds up” as we get older ”

I am 64 years old and have noticed how time seems to be flying by. As a result, I have spent a lot of time thinking about this. I believe a good part of this has to do with perception. If my life span was 250 years long, I do not think that time would appear to be flying by.

That’s one of the reasons I never accept the theory that we are the some total of our experience, the Doctor is convinced humans are biologic computers and being human is much more than that! For instance all life down to the smallest virus contain information stored in the DNA, Doctor!

It’s a relative thing. Einstein theory. As we get older each year is a small er part of our life. When I was 10 each year was 1 tenth of my life. I’m now 67 each year 1 67th of my life

This is my opinion as well. It makes the most sense and I feel age relative to it’s perportion of my life.

I agree… I have often thought your brain is a collection of all of YOUR experiences so if you are 4, you have had 4 birthdays, 4 Christmas’s, 4 summers etc. so everything you have collected in your brain related to time is divided by those events. The duration until the next summer is 1/4 of your total time memory.
At 24? it is 1/24 of your total time memory so you start looking for a new swimsuit in April..
At 84? Well, if you are still counting… it takes a load more time memory dividing than 4. On the plus side you probably wouldn’t be caught dead in a swimsuit! No worries.
😳

I used to think that for a long time, but an alternative just popped into mind that I suspect is actually what is happening. A child sleeps in such a manner that each morning when it wakes up it is like a new being. As we age this capacity for sleep to complete dissolve our feeling of the past fades and as it fades, like an old coat we start to grow as we age which more and more highlights our life as a continuum.
It is almost impossible for person as an adult to experience how they slept as a child, or the degree to which sleep cleaned out automated processes from which we derive our sense of the passage of time. But under certain unusual but natural conditions it can happen. But its possible there is a reason why it biologically happens like this. As we age responsibilities arise that would make the sort of sleep a very young child has impractical.

What in the world does all that mean about SLEEP as a child.
What does ir have to do with time speeding up??

Very well said. Thank you.

That’s a wonderful explanation.
I too feel so.

I like this explanation, it aligns with what I was told by a psychologist many years ago. Simply put, we obviously have a limited amount of memories to pull and reflect on, and they obviously accumulate, very slowly. So as we age, we have more memories to reflect on, thus giving the perception of time to go faster and faster. Slow and steady reality when we are new to the world. And as our memories become more similar and not that different since we are creatures of habit and our memories begin to overlap, time feels like it is going faster.

Just recently I’ve noticed how fast the week goes by especially by Tuesdays. Why Tuesdays speed into the end of the week when time slows a bit.
It is hard to believe it was almost a year ago the riot at the US Capital happened too.
Maybe as we slow our physical lives down we sense a greater change in time—we can experience more from our past lives of memories too. All things are connected so to our senses of sight, sound, touch, etc.

Beautiful and clear

Ah this explanation makes most sense to me!

i have aids i have aids i have aids i have aids

Okay so what does having aids have to do with time speeding up as we age?

I agree it seems there’s a lot of things mentioned here to take into account! I think I likely to be a mixture of things mentioned here. Thought I’d put this here as I enjoyed reading this: Although not suggested as a valid reason, I too used to wonder about a lot but as a teenager. I became convinced that we were getting a little closer to the sun each year, like how water goes down a plug hole. I even suggested it to my science teacher! 🙂

wow that’s a fascinating reality and theory

Maybe it’s just the total amount of time speeding up, in the same way the total amount of space is getting bigger: the closer we are to the end of time and space, the faster it goes.

That is exactly the rational I was told once. It makes sense to me for this to be the most logical. Very interesting conversation piece. One of those things in life we will just have to form our own individual opinions as to why this is a common feeling when it relates to age.

I AM 81 YEARS YOUNG WITH SOME HEALTH ISSUES THAT I PAY CLOSE ATTENTION TO..TIMES DOES SEEM TO FLY..I REMEMBER WHEN I WAS YOUNGER TIME WAS NOT A FACTOR I TRY TO USE THIS CONCEPT TO ENJOY LIFE EACH AND EVERY DAY..THANKS FOR LISTENING

Okay thanks but im67 feel older and wiser

This seems to make more sense then the argument presented in the article.

that’s brilliant; never thought of it this way.

And when you were 4 each hour was 0.0028% of your life. But 0.0028% of 67 years is 2 months!

These are all amazing thoughts, i can relate 2 alot of them but still cannot help but think that there is more 2 time going this fast since 2019,

I acknowledge that its been going relatively fast previously but now its on a different level,you can have your good 7-8 hour sleep but still feel like you only slept for 2 hours,that’s how fast time flies…i thought i was alone until alot of ppl talked about it and i get to observe how 89% of the people in the public transport/bus i am using is sleeping on route to work and on route home every single day,of complete exhaustion,fatigue…which is because time is going relatively fast and your mind and body can not keep up with the past,which causes the above,the individual is also drained because the time going so fast,which is draining core parts of the spirit and can cause memory gaps/open spaces accure because you not able to be present you moving on a past that is hard for our minds to adapt 2…

I believe that the simple reality is, as you get older, your ability to store the memories of that particular time are compromised. Therefore your brain perceives this as a shorter event period and thus a greater time frame has elapsed versus average memory volume recorded.

“When you sit with a nice girl for two hours you think it’s only a minute, but when you sit on a hot stove for a minute you think it’s two hours. That’s relativity.”

I believe God is telling us we don’t have much time, to get our life right with Him…🙏🛐✝️ Something to think about!

That could be the case I hope.
As a kid days seemed much longer.
Now weeks, months, years seem to fly by.

It is because….time is running out, unlike when we were all 14 and had unlimited time.
Now our minutes are nearly used up, and as Warren Zevon said,
“my sh*t is f*cked up.”

As we get older we forget so much during the course of a year that Xmas seems to come round every few months. However, when we concentrate on what interests us such as my observing my many grandchildren growing up they seem to have been small little adults for millennia with squeaky voices growing only slowly. That’s because I pay them so much attention fascinated by their lives and remembering far more about them and because I make more effort to concentrate. So, for me, day to day life fly’s by but not if you focus on all the events of a subject. Hope that makes sense!

They the eyes of a child. I remember when 6th grade seemed a long way off. But soon I was in high school and then married and having children. Then the children ask way Christmas and birthdays were so far in the distance. As we get older we developed more patience about things. My grand daughter is in high school. Sure. Where did all 66 years go so fast. 6th grade now seems unimportant. But to a first grader it seems a long way off!! Perception. when will I be 90??

I agree with this in so far as I have commented, in a slightly different way!

It’s awesome to hear someone that listens to Warren Zevon. Love that song.

I too have thought that time perception is biological aging. Like a car starting out on a hill, at birth and through childhood, time moves slowly until we reach the top, middle age or just before. Then, as we pass “ over the hill”, just like that car we begin to speed towards death and time seems to speed up as well. It seems to me to be tied to our biological growth and subsequent deterioration. Time perception ruled at a cellular level.

Wow, that is a pretty awesome explanation. Probably the best one I read. Im sitting here at work and this thought came into my head so I had to look into it and after reading so many comments, this is by far the best one.

I agree with you!

I also agree thank you I think Im satisfied with your explanation. I wish we never deteriorated or at least stopped at about 30. Theres not enough time so many never get to do the things they want to do in life. Makes me very sad I need more time Im not done yet.

That’s a good theory.
Being young, we are always looking forward to certain things. Because they were special occasions for us then.
But once grown n basically doing same thing for years on end, not much to look forward to.
Christmas seems to come every few months now, as a kid it seemed like forever until next Christmas.

As kids Christmas was the best day of the year, as adults ( most of us) it’s just another time we need to try and find a bunch of gifts that we hope they like.
Buying gifts for kids is easy, adults, not so much, if adults want something they just buy it themselves

I’m 64 as well, but I also observe personally that time seems to slow when I have many tasks during the day, particularly if I’m absorbed in the tasks. But as I age I’m less involved in tasks and feel like time is elapsing quickly. Just wondering if not being as active, physically and/or mentally is more of the condition leading to these observations.

I totally agree with having fewer ‘tasks’, especially since I retired. On the busy days, time goes slower than on the less busy. When I was working, 5:00 took forever to arrive. Therefore I’ve decided I must have a daily schedule to help slow time down! I’m hoping it does the trick.

I discovered this also!

I think so. When you feel content and focused time appears to be different. Its how we think, we’re programmed! When we change our thinking by re-wiring, we change our perception. I’m 67 and by re-wiring my old programming, I’m feeling younger daily. So I guess I’m saying, I feel like I have another 67 years left, lol!

I agree. Also, when you’re younger, a year, for example is a larger percentage of the time you’ve been alive. As we age, a year becomes a smaller and smaller percentage of the time we’ve been alive, so it seems to go by faster as a result. That’s how I look at it anyway. All relative 🙂

Hi Robbin,
Hope all is well. Time flies. I was in high school just a few years ago. The sadness of time’s speed brought me here. Hope you are well.

Hi everyone, I am new to this site. This is a very interesting conversation. Here is my “two cents worth” I am 80 yrs old now and beginning to have some symptoms of forgetfulness. I love living, love my family, and love God, not necessarily in that order. In conversations with family members like my sister and brother, I remember things about our family when we were all young. Our father died at 37yrs old of esophageal cancer, and our mother had a rare skin disorder. We lived in a low price house district in Wichita Falls, Texas. She was on Social Security and a small salary from the movie theatre where she was a cashier. She managed to feed and clothe us with little money. She had a rare blood disease that caused sores on her legs, so she would wear a pair of support hose to cover her bandaged legs. She always looked nice and was pleasant to be around. She was 47 when she died. I have lived much longer than she did. Have I done it as well? I just hope to be as strong as she was before I die. My husband is gone too, but I have wonderful children who help me and a few close friends that I love. Be thankful for every day, be kind and helpful, and appreciate every breath, knowing that God gives it and knowing HIM is the best thing that can ever happen to a person. Living in America is a gift to treasure, take care of, and be thankful for. I know this isn’t really on the tenor of the conversation, but it’s my “two cents worth” Be Blessed.

Edna, thank you for sharing! You are so wise, and I appreciate your wisdom.

I’m 62. I agree. I think it would eventually seem to start passing faster, just probably much later, like when you’re 210-220 vs 50-60 as we experience.

Simply put, because “time is running out.” When we are young, we have all the time in the world and we unconsciously think we are going to live forever. However, when we hit a certain age (for me 70), we become very conscious that “time is running out” and we are “speeding toward death.” Our desire to “hold onto life” and “slow the passage of time” makes time go faster, i.e., when I was young, I wanted time to go faster (I wanted to be older); however, as I age, I want to time to slow down because I don’t want to get older. My 2 cents!

The distance between the Moon and the Earth affect the speed of the Earths rotation due to magnetic friction. The moon is in a different spot in the sky everyday, the closer the moon is one day the more magnetic friction slows the Earths rotation and a longer day is had. Another day the moon is in a different spot a bit further away, now the Earths rotation picks up speed a bit and a shorter day is had. That’s my intuitive thought anyways.

All i want to say that my elementary school lasted forever, as well as days in a high school. Times began to fly when in a college.

Why does time goes faster as we get older? That’s a crazy idea.

Guys, let’s be real. Ultimately there’s no such thing as a time machine. In other words, it is what it is. Time is goin by quick because we wasting time thinking about why time goes by quick. Live in the moment, it’s yours. In the meantime, take me back to Love Machine.

Agree. Your as young as you feel!@

You make more sense than the professor!

Thank you! This seems quite easy, But again…its perception! Some here say that time goes slower when they are more active…I cant understand how that is possible…oh well…

It’s like the commercial “when a body is in motion, it stay’s in motion “ I guess! When I’m more present and focused my time slows also.

Wait until you’re 70. Your opinion might just change.

Wait till you’re 80 plus. I’m trying too hard to do well at not trying too hard to do well. Say that 3 times fast, if there’s time. (smile)
an Octogenarian

i have one question for you ma’am

is that true my running speed increase when i grow
which age is good to get fast speed

Austin Feinberg – time doesn’t go faster. Our perception of time makes it appear to go faster. I have a lot more to think about these days so I don’t spend as much time observing and enjoying, as I used to.

Death and a Black Hole have common traits. Time moves faster as we get nearer our time of death. Just as an object gets nearer a Black Hole the faster it travels. Death is the non-existence of time as is the object that travels into a Black Hole approaching non-existence.

I have used the whirlpool as an analogy since I started perceiving time speeding up about 10 years ago in my mid-40’s. When I was young we are on the outer parts of the whirlpool, but as I get older I move closer and closer, time moves faster and faster until I reach the middle at the end of life. And thennnn….

and Theeeeeeeeennnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn…………………..you go back home to your
Heavenly Father where you came from and, continue growing as a person. You are his child. If you have questions, please read at LDS.org,

Geeze..I thought I was depressed before…..I take it you’re an Atheist….

I am 20 and my birthday is in 3 months time, more and more it feels like days turn into weeks and months just fly by. My 20th b day seems like it was about 5 months ago. Depressing me big time

I am 14 and already thinking about this wich causes me anxiety and difficulty to sleep so like i’d like to know if theres a way to fix this issue.

Me too. Let me know if you find anything.

While listening to a podcast about Frank Ocean’s song “Skyline To” a very academic Cole Chuchna explains that a scientific study suggests that in our youth, time seems to pass slowly because it is chock full of new experiences, which the brain marks with importance. This makes youth feel longer. As we age and settle into schedules, our experiences blend together and become the same, making time seem to move faster than before. My opinion? Be curious for new experiences with ravenous hunger.

My thoughts exactly, Azwaw.

You have anxiety and difficulty sleeping because your mind is obsessed with these spalling thoughts. My mind was in turmoil when I was a teenager.
The perception of time is like riding a sleigh off a snow covered mountain. The sleigh picks up speed as it descends. It’s the same way with I us
As we get older time seems to speed up. It’s been my experience and approaching my eighty sixth birthday it’s like riding a rocket. The years are whizzing by and it seems like only yesterday that I was just fourteen!
I suggest learning to live in the eternal NOW and accepting the things you cannot change. Decide who you are and what your mission is during your brief journey on spaceship earth. Be grateful for each day because it is a Present.
Peace and Blessings Always remember that God loves you!

I liked what you just said.

Amen! “Live in the Eternal now!” I completely agree! your days here on earth are so very precious. So enjoy the time you have without worry of time. Enjoy your life! its a gift! Take chances, tell the people you love, that you love them! take that trip! go on that adventure! ask for that promotion! ask her or him out! instead of worrying about time, think of all the things you can still do, and don’t hesitate to do them!
And yes God loves you! Don’t ever forget that!

Bless you Thank you for your wise and beautiful thoughts and input

Thanks Timothy. Your refreshing outlook and advice is well received.

Thank you so much, that was well said.

How does one learn to live in the now sir. I don’t know if I can learn that at this point. I believe in God Jesus and the Holy Ghost. Why am I always crying I want to be happy, grow a garden, have a home with pets and people,family and friends, cookouts and back yard party’s. Trips to exotic places for 2 weeks out of the year or camping at the lake or the mountains. I want to ride a zip line and fly my own personal bicycle. There’s no more time. I’ve wasted so much time. Im sorry Im just scared anymore all the time
Thanks for listening. Peace

Don’t worry about it. Spend time enjoying every day and make sure to appreciate all the good things and people in your life. That’s the most important thing. That we enjoy the journey. The fact that you are already thinking about this means that you are very special.

They’re all gone.

I’m 25 and time is moving by faster every year. Life is short. I might be 25 now but soon I’ll be like 70 in a blink of an eye. As you get older, you experience less new things. Society forces you into this path, because you have to work. It becomes monotonous. There are also biological reasons that cause time to pass faster. There’s nothing you can do except keep doing things you like. Have no regrets when you get old.

Just stop thinking about it so much. Relax and enjoy life. Don’t intend to sound so cliche but you are still a youngster. Wait till your in your 60s and older. You think time is flying by now? I did same thing. Just relax😀

Time slows down when we lose technology. Think about the last time the power went out. What did you do? How long did the hours seem? I have been putting my phone away as much as i can for this reason.
Monotony is another reason time seems to speed away from us. If you’re doing the same things every day there isn’t much to remember.
Lose your screens and go make some memories. It will help, with both time and with general happiness.

You need to learn and practice mindfulness techniques! You also need to try new experiences and balance your life with self care, creativity, and work. You are anxious and feeling empty because you are missing something bigger, outside of yourself. A higher power. I recommend starting with a Unitarian Church. They expose you to all religions, allowing you to make a connections and meet your Savior.

Same, man. The saddest part for me is probably the realization that time is flying by so fast. My dad is almost turning fifty and I regret that I couldn’t spend more valuable time with him when he was in his early-mid 40s. Now I just wish that he had me earlier so we’d be able to spend more time together.

Wait until your dad is over 70 while having the knowledge that time is finite as a person’s odds of mortal survival decrease mathematically each year of aging. Hope to celebrate his 80th, 85th, 90th, and so on, but I’m given no guarantee.
I live with a certain amount of dread on this as an only child with no other close family members except for my significant other.

Don’t worry we are all just a perspective of the universe. The universe experiencing itself. We have connected consciousness. Different currents of consciousness from the same pool. Experiencing life as a different perspective in different times. So in essence if we share consciousness and come from the same consciousness. We never die. We are literally each other.

No, what is depressing is my friend who died from Cancer at the age of 23. In your 20’s have balance. Have 3 hobbies. One that makes you money, one that you enjoy and let’s you be creative, and one that keeps you fit and healthy. Practice mindfulness, travel, save your money, and Practice mindfulness – a 39 year old.

Part of the experience is possibly the lack of novelty and the deterioration of comprehension. The inability to fully absorb oneself into events so that they subjectively integrate more slowly so that Comprehenion and reality are out of phase.

Interesting it is moving faster with in the confines of the wall clock ……seems impossible but it is…..it’s not in our head………..or it’s moving quicker

Utter nonsense. Time move more slowly as things accelerate more. It’s part and parcel of the general theory of relativity.

Absolutely a goal, now to obtain control over aging (with out surgical procedures) will be my challenge.

Alan Byron, we as children find everything so fascinating and everything is new to us! As we get older we become “adults” and that is what destroys our curiosity I guess and perhaps school and society in general, the media trains us to become part of the herd. We need to become children again, meaning to be in awe of new things.

Would you please explain this further? This is so interesting!

The speed of time is dependent on the processing of data from the environment…as we age less changes so we process the environment with less data… less data less time to process it… less time spent in 3D reality where time is experienced

I don’t think it already happens to me because of my age, but im forgetting more and more along the time. Im 16 and a day feels like a week. I also don’t remember a lot from a couple years ago

My theory is that it is about percentages: when we are young each additional year is a large per of our life (ie from 5 to 6 is 20% of our life). As we get older each year is a smaller and smaller percentage. ( ie 50 to 51 is only an additional 2%). I think that we feel percentage changes more than the absolute change.

I’ve thought about that. It’s kind of depressing to think that the time from 20 to 40 seems the same as 40 to death

About time (sic!) that someone cited this obvious fact! Thank you!

so my theory is that time goes faster as we get older because when we die w dont know if would turn into ghost plus time can be a ghost going through time faster anf faster if u think about it its an additional 50% of life
its sad…

Simpler answer…… When you are 10 years old 1 year is 1 tenth of you
existence. When you are 50 year old it’s 1 fiftieth of you existence. So
going from 10 years old to 11 – is the same as going from 50 year old to 55.
Living 1/10 more of your existence.

my brother reminds me of this every year on my birthday.
i don’t buy this “image processing” thing.

It’s all about how you remember things. If I think about the birth of my daughter 6 years ago in relation to celebrating her birthday it seems like time has just skipped in a flash. But then if you think about all the other things in between like first time walking, learning to ride a bike, first day of school, etc. it makes the day of her birth feel further away.

This article kind of help me have hope that I have time still. That I am not going to go to sleep one day at 40 and wake up at 80.
https://www.brainpickings.org/2013/07/15/time-warped-claudia-hammond/

“The problem with the proportionality theory is that it fails to account for the way we experience time at any one moment. We don’t judge one day in the context of our whole lives. If we did, then for a 40-year-old every single day should flash by because it is less than one fourteen-thousandth of the life they’ve had so far. It should be fleeting and inconsequential, yet if you have nothing to do or an enforced wait at an airport for example, a day at 40 can still feel long and boring and surely longer than a fun day at the seaside packed with adventure for a child. … It ignores attention and emotion, which … can have a considerable impact on time perception.”

Exactly! When you look at your life through the lens of hindsight with a macro view, of course time appears to have flown by. But if you could take each year of your life and list what you did every day….week by week, month by month, year by year, you would realize how little time actually did fly by, and what a long journey it’s been to get to where you are today.

Can you imagine it’s going to be 20 years since 9 11? I have been having a hard time processing this as to me it has felt as still does feel like it’s been 5, maybe 6 but not 7 years since. What the heck is going on?

It is because it is a memory that is constantly recalled and reviewed in great detail. So it feels fresh every time you recall the memory regardless of how much time has passed. The clearer a memory is to us the closer it will appear. Especially when you are only recalling that event. Start adding in things that have happened since then and it will start to stretch out the time frame.

I think this is why time seems to get faster when we are older. We have more days to remember. A lot is redundant. Even things like birthdays and holidays no matter how fun they are become routine. Finding something special and unique in those moments can help you separate out those moments. Upon quick recall it is going to seem like something a while back happened just yesterday.

For me I went to Vegas 4 years ago. It was memorable and I think about it a lot. So I go how they hell did 4 years pass by already. But then I start thinking about the other trips I have gone on in between and all the other big moments since then and it then starts to bridge that time and actually make it feel like 4 years have passed.

I still struggle with it a lot though as I am about to turn 34 and my kids are going to be 8 and 6 and thinking how fast 10 years will fly and they will be going to or getting ready to go to college. You want to remember everything in great detail and not miss out or forget anything, but it literally is impossible. It is just something I guess we have to learn to live with.

Oh man, that’s a great way to think of it.

I do that all the time – have a clear memory and that same feeling of how is this so long ago. Filling in other memories really does help.

This makes me feel more at ease.

All we truly have is now. So live life to the fullest in every moment. Enjoy the ones your with, enjoy the ones you love. Because before you know it time will pass us by.

I always thought it was a matter of percentage. As a youngster, each day was a significant percentage of my entire life. So of course it seemed longer. Not only that, but the percentage of new experiences was greater. As a teenager more things were repeat, but still plenty of new things, and the days and weeks were each a slightly smaller slice of the total. So the progression continued as I became an adult.
Now I’m in my 70s. Each day is a much smaller slice of my total time here. And I’m doing many more things for the *last* time than for the first. I’m not surprised the last year has been a blink.

Incredible perspective 🙌 Thank you for sharing your insight ❤️☀️

I have noticed that when we go away on holiday for a fortnight, the first week passes much slower than the second. When we go away for only one week, the time still seems to pass slowly – the second half doesn’t rush by. I think that this has to do with novelty factor. The first seven days are more of a novelty than the last 7. Similarly a weekend away seems far longer than one spent at home doing the usual things. If we want time to pass more slowly perhaps we should try to break up the routine with new experiences.

Thank you so much for your efforts and helping us answer our most important and complex questions!
I’m feeling better now that I know what’s the reason why time pass this quickly…I’m 23 though…

The Denman Effect

Christopher Denman drops in
Punctually once a year,
Yet surprised I always am
Him earlier to behold.
This anomaly in time
I will name, ‘ The Denman Effect ‘,
For Denman shows me that time
Flows faster as one grows old!

Boghos L. Artinian

Psychologist William James, in his 1890 text Principles of Psychology, wrote that as we age, time seems to speed up because adulthood is accompanied by fewer and fewer memorable events. When the passage of time is measured by “firsts” (first kiss, first day of school, first family vacation), the lack of new experiences in adulthood, James morosely argues, causes “the days and weeks [to] smooth themselves out…and the years grow hollow and collapse.
I agree with William James from this 130 year old thesis. There is little “newness”, and a lack of things to “look forward to” as we get older. This is particularly true after age 65 (ish). Once retired, we have no “firsts” to excite us, and wait in anticipation for. At age 67, I am grateful to “look forward” vicariously, to the life events of my grandchildren (7 of them)…I look forward to passing along all the love and knowledge obtained throughout my own life. It is really perception, in the end. Another post stated that if our lifespan was 150 + years, this would be different.

With the passing of time & the speed at which it increases as time passes, my biggest regret is turning down endless opportunities to sleep with woman. I married very young & am a faithful, loving husband, but man I turned my back on so many pretty girls & free rides. Eat up everything you can that’s my advice.

Get rid of your computer, phone and TV. Read new books, go for walks. Time will slow dramatically.

I believe time passes more slowly when someone else is responsible for your well-being, you don’t have adult worries/responsibilities, and therefore you’re always in the moment. Mindfulness (or being in the moment) makes life seem longer and time seem slower. Once you reach adulthood and you’re constantly worried about things and planning ahead, you stop being in the moment. You’re always thinking and planning instead of just existing in the moment. Think about the way a toddler can lay down on the floor and stare at a bug moving or half an hour. Time goes slower for them because they are in the moment. And that’s it.

We are like an objects falling to the ground, the closer to the ground the grater the speed of the object. We begin to fall at the moment of conception. We are the object falling, time is the speed we are falling at…. the ground is death

This isn’t why time seems to fly by. This is just an analogy.

I think we think and worry too much and that makes us start living in fear. Trust in God. He is in charge. Yesterday is gone and tomorrow is uncertain. Smile and find things to be grateful for. Being happy makes a big difference.

Unpopular opinion, but still an opinion.
I wish I had that remote control from that movie Click. I want to fast-forward my life 15 years and be retired. And then, do whatever I want, whatever that is, as I want it, whenever I want it, without having to wake up early and see the same old stupid faces at work, having to deal with more ungrateful patients.
Apart from working in a hospital, I have been a patient myself since my unnecessary birth. Going into and coming out of hospitals my entire life. Renal issues. Being anxious to do medical exams every month to see if I have stable results, to adjust medication intake.

I don’t want to anger anyone by saying this but to any who suggests that God loves me, I have tried the god thing and it doesn’t work. To anyone who might say that there are worse things out there, there is nothing godly about that.

15 years. Everyone says how fast time goes by. I even started counting the days one by one, till my retirement. And they seem infinite.

I don’t have children and I don’t want any. I just need to pass the rest of my life peacefully. My life may be boring then when I get retired.
But at least it will be boring without obligations.

I’m 42 this year, and time goes by so much faster than let’s say 22.my 30’s flew by very fast! Where’d they go.

I also find you fear death less as you age, or is that just me? I once feared death as a child, but I honestly don’t anymore.

So much changes as we age! Developmental psychology plays a role imo.

I fear death very much! The loss of my parents, husband, brother, even pets. Spirituality comforts me. I don’t want to cease to exist. To not be conscious. Though I have been Depressed, I would never want to never “BE”… As am Empath I get many messages and know things that I couldn’t possibly know. So it gives me faith.

times go by fast I seemed cant collect my goals “meet goals” before I get too old so please explain to me how to get it done?

The theory I align closely to on why time seems to move faster as we get older is closer to perception and your own collection of new experiences.

While growing up, most experiences are new – so they get captured and stored, we can look back and think about all the fun stuff we did. So the perception is that time was dragged out longer, while in actuality you were just experiencing more new events which your brain would process and put into storage banks. Every year in school would be different, different classes, different extra activities, different teachers and sometimes different kids to meet or schools entirely. This all adds up to new experiences constantly. We learned, interacted and did a LOT in those years that were less tedious as we have gotten older.

Now, we go to the same job/career and perform the same routines over and over. We pay our bills, we cook dinner, we take care of the kids, we clean the house and so on. These things do change, but for the most part they are the same day in and day out. That is why, when you ask someone what they did last week – They have to struggle to remember, because these tedious motions that we mostly play on repeat all merge together. And before you know it, another year is down and you are wondering where the heck the time went.

Anyone that has gone through a huge life change, via loss of a loved one or loss of a job which dramatically changed their life will probably never say – “This was the fastest year of my life!”. That is because the events of your life have made you stop, focus and pay attention to what is going on which drags things out. Once things settle and you get back into the “rhythm” of life, it will speed up again.

Also, if you are in a career/job that you hate and are always looking forward to the weekend – Then you are speeding up your life by always looking for the future and not enjoying it on the daily. You are living for 2 days off per week instead of enjoying the full 7.

That is my thoughts on it.

Thanks for reading!

A child sleeps in such a profound manner that when they awaken, they awaken like a new born in comparison to an aged person so that even the day before feels like much more like a remote past than it does as we age. Its not that they don’t remember what happened the day before but that the weight off it has been removed overnight (all things being equal).

One cannot remember this under normal conditions that this was our experience in later life because it is alien to the momentum of our current experience. Having said that one can rediscover this phenomena of being “washed clean” in sleep patterns in later life which has the exact same effect. One can leave work on Friday and then return on Monday with the sensation that one had been away for vastly extended period, as if one had gone on a distant all engulfing vacation over several months.

The exact mechanism I could not explain but am convinced it is, like a dream that goes for a few minutes but in its passage of time feels like it lasted several days. Is fundamentally related to our relationship to sleep.

As we age this capacity for sleep to profoundly regenerate us becomes encrusted to the point where days merge into a virtual break less continuum giving the sensation that things are passing faster without any real pause.

excuse the typos, my friends, the gist is there.

I’m a (soon) 15 year old, and since the last school year started the time flies so fast. It’s monday and right away it’s friday again, which makes me kinda sad, because I like school and I don’t want to leave already.

How fascinating…
This has been on my mind as a child. I was drawn to my elderly neighbors at age 10. They became my best friends. I told my mother at age 12: we are ALL the same age. We just get there at different times. I have always had a very strong urging and thoughts about various subjects, especially the human existence. I am in tune spiritually and emotionally.

My 2c on this issue is that when we are old/older we already master all the routines we go by during the day/week/month/year. Theres not much learning of anything at all. Try enrolling in a new university course or new challenging online course to see how things shift. Cheers from Vancouver, Canada.

I’m 57 I thought time was starting to fly buy in my 40’s onward. I read that it was due to us having a decline in Melatonin. So I got some tablets and take them from time to time. I don’t seem to perceive time flying by anymore….

I think the doctor has a valid point. When you are a child and younger not only your mind will process everything faster and make decisions faster. So growing older all of it will slow down and tasks that used to take you no time take you longer and longer. At least for me since I’ve always been doer and wanting to experience new things and generally do stuff my time seems to be measured by accomplishments in my mind. Days I do nothing just mean nothing and are wiped out of the timeline.
The workday when I was younger it was exiting and I was thinking about it already taking a shower in the morning and it never felt like work. Nowadays I feel I just go to work and don’t learn anything and at the end of the day it was just another workday that doesn’t need to be on my timeline of the memories. So it gets wiped out and surely takes about half of the waking hours out.
Just my thoughts and been thinking it long time. In purpose I do lots of activities since I realize time is passing by but even then the fact remains, when you age you slow down and the activities take longer so with less experiences to remember time seems to have moved faster.

I think the reason time goes by faster as an adult, is simply because we are orienting our lives based on a block type schedule rather than simply living in the moment as children do. We are always anticipating the next day, and the next goal. Whether it be yearning for Friday to come on a Monday or planning a big move a year ahead, hating your job and zoning out to get through the day, commuting. It all seems to become so automatic that the time it takes to actually do these things seems to pass by so quickly.

Our perception of time is based on our value of time. When we are young we don’t think about the past we can only think of what is ahead of us, therefore we wish the time to speed up. As we age, we reminisce on past times and realize our days are dwindling away from us. Which leaves us wanting more and realizing the value of each day that passes. I teach my children to value each age that u become because u only get it once, also not to wish the days away because before we know it, they will be gone.

Our perception of time is based on our value of time. When we are young we don’t think about the past we can only think of what is ahead of us, therefore we wish the time to speed up. As we age, we reminisce on past times and realize our days are dwindling away from us. Which leaves us wanting more and realizing the value of each day that passes. I teach my children to value each age that u become because u only get it once, also not to wish the days away because before we know it, they will be gone.

As we grow older, it can often feel like time goes by faster and faster. … This is what leads to time passing more rapidly. When we are young, each second of actual time is packed with many more mental images. Like a slow-motion camera that captures thousands of images per second, time appears to pass more slowly.
The Earth is moving faster than it ever has in the last 50 years, scientists have discovered, and experts believe that 2021 is going to be the shortest year in decades. … This is because the Earth is spinning faster on its axis quicker than it has done in decades and the days are therefore a tiny bit shorter.
On July 19, 2020, the actual day on Earth was 1.4602 milliseconds shorter than a full 24 hours, making it the shortest day ever recorded. Since then, the record short day has been broken a total of 28 times. Now in 2021, days are spinning faster, nearly 0.5 milliseconds shorter than a full 24 hours.
that’s the fact😁

Something I’ve noticed, when you are perceiving a new experience, time seems to slow as you’re working harder to understand and take on the new information, but once you experience that same thing again, you already know what to expect, so it’s not particularly memorable or worth much thought, and so it seems to pass faster, as we get older we collect more experiences, and so are very likely to experience the same things day to day, and why would we remember every single repetition of what we already know from the first experience?
The real secret to a long life is filling every day with new experiences, making memories.

Simpler answer…… When you are 10 years old 1 year is 1 tenth of you
existence. When you are 50 year old 5 years is 1 tenth of your existence.
So going from 10 years old to 11 – feels the same as going from 50 year old to 55.
(living 1/10 more of your total existence) So of course, 1 year at age 55 feels faster
than 1 year at age 10.

My mom has always complained about how everyday felt faster and what seemed to be happened a long time ago she said she swore happened last week. I’m in ninth grade now and I know I’m younger than most people here, but I feel like my mom was right and time does feel so much faster obviously not that everything is speeding up it’s just that I swore I only started processing January to March 2021 and now it’s December, I don’t remember experiencing any other month only doing little things here and there, but certainly not enough memories for 9 months. I don’t like how I am just watching life pass me before I can realize it and I try hard to remember my experiences so I have a time stamp to sort of return to it and know that that month actually happened. Maybe it was the pandemic but I was just 12 in March 2020 and now I’m going to graduate freshman year.

It is a strange companion we travel through Life with,
this rapscalion Time.
In our early youth, she demurs and seems to take forever to pass,
But yet, when we learn the ropes of Life,
this temptress, Time, seems to take on a hurried gate.
Even then, we often find that she has tricked us and ran on ahead,
Surprising us with fleeting moments
which flit from now to yesterday to yesteryear in a blink.
As we learn enough to sit in wisdom
and contemplate Time’s journey at our side,
We yearn for the frolic of youth when she seemed to take forever,
Yet even now we give homage to Time for remaining with us,
And offering us whatever yesterdays and tomorrows that she so deigns.

K. Ready circa 2021

They told me to follow the science yet there is no consensus on the time speeding up phenomenon. All I know is that my physical experience is more rich and meaningful because I have faith that when my time is up, I will no longer be bound by the limits of time.

Bullsheeve as you age and find time is greater and your fullfilment within that time is diminished you succumb. Purpose in life is the only thing that is going to keep you alive and time in perspective.

Reall interesting phenomenon. I remember, when I was a kid, the movies seems to be last much longer than they do now. Tow hours of the movie used to seem like a 6 hour of intense watch time, now days seems to be pass like an hour.

Inspired by this article, we tried to do a video on it, I hope you’ll like it: https://youtu.be/VigCbcLjm_0

I think it’s related to soul development. The older you grow, the more you experience, and your soul develops as well. This speeds up the time that you experience as a person. So in your next reincarnation, the environment time-stamp also speeds up.

More time is slower, not faster.

The first question is: what is time. We perhaps define as the duration between events and select what we perceive as events that that are stable. The movement of the earth, the sun or atoms in atomic clocks. Whatever we use; they are observable within our world, solar system and universe. Outside the universe is unknown, unexplored and anyones guess. Light is the sacred fundamental measurement of something alongside gravity. But what would we observe if we didn’t exist in a world of light and gravity? Imagine if our world was at the bottom of the deepest ocean: the abyss, no light and gravity exists, but the the water effective disguises it. Time clearly exist, because things happen. There is a duration of time between events but how would they be measured?
If you are aware of your own existence, then the length of your life is how you can perceive it. To a three year old a year is a long time ie a third of their living memory, but to an eighty year old, a year is ony an 80th of their living memory. As a general rule: size seems important for lifespan and the slower the activity the longer the life. Ultimately, totally inanimate objects like rocks and mountains stay around for millions of years, but I have no ambition to be one.

It’s all illusion. My experience is that things that happened two weeks ago feel like an eternity. I think it also has to do with consciousness eg. You’re driving and suddenly realize you went five miles (daydreaming?) and how does that differ from dreaming what we dream while asleep? Soon none it will matter as technology encroaches more and more on our ” experience”. The tech giants have us right where they want after all how could we survive sans cellphones, tablets, games it’s dizzying. I digress.

Wow, the comments on this article is absolutely full of craziness.

I don’t know why people think they have the knowledge and experience to refute a paper by an actual expert, the dunning kruger effect is quite apparent.

The amount of pseudoscientific nonsense also present should really warm people off of this website.

I just woke up from a dream where I asked Biden logical questions and he had a legitimate rebuttal instead of his usual incoherent babble. Im having chest pains smelling onions, as I woke up, having gas and can’t fart, maybe it’s the taco bell. I’ve thought about time and perception for a long time. I feel like I’m autistic and my brain seems to function super fast but time seems to speed up and slow down for me. I’ve thought about rotation of the earth being faster. When I quit smoking for 9 months it felt as though I would sleep for 15 hours but time was slow. Lately time is flying I think it’s a separation of mind and body like your mental state, or your cognitive function vs your mental outlook and cognitive function. I can’t explain that but I use to daydream for twenty minutes after I woke up when I was younger I remember putting one sock on and thinking about all kinds of shit in ten min. Then putting the other sock on and repeating. I also remembering an article about earths rotation was faster due to man made things on earth idk. Females are not equal to men and the political agenda and the way people think is going backwards. Females are different and have specific jobs that men can not do, especially multi tasking. “I identify as” is the same as “I pretend to be”. Instead of useless shit we see everyday from tv and thought police, why not use the portion of your brain to create more expression through common sense instead of idiocy. Idk I need to fart bad. I’m going to try to sleep now. My point was now that women have blue hair and are professional victims men no longer serve their purpose and will die younger. Without purpose there is no life…… We have to stop these climate change enthusiasts instead of bitching about it. I honestly believe you shouldn’t be on the internet unless you pass a test to use it. Seriously. It would be very beneficial to stupid people and give them purpose. Without purpose and routine time will fly.

A well experienced sales person can do this job only effectively. People who are not sure about outcome based selling should give it a visit. They will be find it very useful.

Oh my gosh. I think you’re all overthinking this. I don’t buy this theory at all. It’s not my perceptions that are off, it’s that it takes longer to do things and we get distracted and daydream more when we are older. I find myself daydreaming, standing there doing nothing, lost in thought and the next thing I know 5 minutes have past and I accomplished nothing. You have less energy and more pain and mobility issues so everything is harder to do so it all takes longer. You simply get less done in an hour than you used to. So you run out of time to do things and the day seems shorter. The other issue this article does not address is that it seems to be affecting everyone regardless of age. The years just seem to be flying by. Two recent examples…locally recent events reminded people of a past event that happened 4 years ago but numerous people of varying ages all commented that it happened a couple of years ago. As I was having the same feeling, I checked for the actual date and it was 4 years ago to the month. Mentioning that surprised everyone. The other example…an incident happened two weeks ago but in conversation we all kept saying “last week” and acting like it had happened a week ago, but after looking at my calendar I realized it was 2 weeks to the day that it happened. Again, the people involved are of varying ages. I would expect that the older the person is, the more inaccurate the perception of time passage would be, but that is not the case. That is why I reject this article’s theory. I just don’t see it manifesting in real life. Something else is going on. Could be all the wifi and cellphone signals and all the different forms of technological radiation we are exposed to constantly. Or could also be due to our constant bombardment of incoming information via TV, radio, phones, internet, any mobile device, etc. We never really have time to ourselves to just relax. There is always something to do. We’re constantly go go go all day. It didn’t used to be like that. I remember getting bored a lot. I haven’t been bored in years. I’m 51.

A stopwatch on the brain’s perception of time

Steady hands? Time appears to pass more quickly when we are busy than when we are bored. Photograph: David Sillitoe

Steady hands? Time appears to pass more quickly when we are busy than when we are bored. Photograph: David Sillitoe

O ur perception of time changes with age, but it also depends on our emotional state. Research is steadily improving our understanding of the brain circuits that control this sense, opening the way for new forms of treatment, particularly for Parkinson’s disease.

Time is an integral part of our daily life, regardless of whether we are in a hurry, relaxed, gripped by an emotion or bored stiff. We may be walking, driving, listening to music, hearing the phone ring, taking part in a conversation or doing a sport, but time is always there, omnipresent and immaterial. Whereas all our senses – sight, touch, hearing, smell and taste – bring into play specialised sensory receptors, there is no specific receptor for time. Yet it is present in us, our brain being a real timing machine.

«From infancy onwards babies must come to grips with a world marked by recurrent time patterns, learning the length of time, or duration, associated with the various actions they experience every day,» says Professor Sylvie Droit-Volet, at the Social and Cognitive Psychology Laboratory (Lapsco) at Blaise Pascal University, Clermont Ferrand, France. «They react, become agitated or cry, when something they expect does not occur on time: when the mobile over their bed stops turning earlier than usual, when their mother takes too long preparing a feed,» she adds.

Very young children «live in time» before gaining an awareness of its passing. They are only able to estimate time correctly if they are made to pay attention to it, experiencing time in terms of how long it takes to do something. «For a three-year-old, time is multifaceted, specifically related to each action,» Droit-Volet explains. At the age of five or six a child is able to transpose the duration it has learned to associate with a particular action (pressing a rubber ball) to another (pulling on a lever). «They begin to realise that a single time continuum exists separately from individual actions,» she adds.

The awareness of time improves during childhood as children’s attention and short-term memory capacities develop, a process dependent on the slow maturation of the prefrontal cortex. To gauge the time required for a task they must pay attention to it. But they must also memorise a stream of time-data without losing concentration. So children suffering from attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder find it hard to gauge time correctly.

One way of improving accuracy is by counting time. «A five-year-old cannot count the passing of time, but can do so if prompted by an adult. But their counting does not really keep pace with the seconds. At the age of eight, children start counting time on their own, keeping cadence, but not till they are 10 will they count time regularly and of their own accord, without input from an adult,» Droit-Volet says.

On the basis of our early ability to estimate passing time, researchers suggested in 1963 that time as perceived by our brains (subjective time) was synchronised with the ticking of an internal clock, in much the same way as our daily life is governed by the ticking of our watch (objective time). They modelled a mechanism for measuring time, a sort of internal clock. It consists of a pacemaker, continuously emitting pulses (ticking), which are stored in an accumulator. The subjective duration of time depends on the number of pulses that have accumulated (since the beginning of the stimulus). When the internal clock speeds up, the number of pulses increases, creating the impression that time is passing more slowly.

Furthermore, if you stop paying attention to time, the pulses are blocked and no longer reach the accumulator. As these pulses are not counted, time will appear shorter than it really is. Although the internal-clock model is useful for predicting the behaviour of subjects taking part in psychological research, it is only a metaphor and does not stand up in terms of brain physiology or anatomy.

At the beginning of the century, Professor Warren Meck, at the Duke Institute for Brain Science, North Carolina, developed a more physiologically realistic model. According to the striatal beat-frequency model of interval timing, the representation of time is underpinned by the oscillatory activity of brain cells in the upper cortex. The activity of each oscillator cell is characterised by a specific rhythm. The frequency of oscillations is detected by certain cells in the dorsal striatum, a substructure of the basal ganglia, located at the base of the forebrain.

«Each of these brain cells has up to 30,000 connections with a series of cells in the cortex oscillating at various frequencies. The neurons in the striatum can read time codes emitted by oscillator cells in the cortex. They come into action when oscillatory activity corresponds to previously detected patterns, stored in memory,» Meck explains.

Alongside this model, in which estimates of time intervals originate in neuronal activity, the brain structures involved in processing time-related data differ depending on whether they are estimating the duration of a stimulus (explicit timing) or gauging the lapse of time, or interval, separating us from an event expected to occur in a few seconds or minutes (implicit timing).

«For durations ranging from a few milliseconds to several minutes, the processing of explicit and implicit timing does not bring into play the same neuroanatomical regions,» says Jennifer Coull, a senior research fellow at the Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, at Provence University in Marseille. These differences are due to the fact that «implicit-time processing is almost always used to achieve a motor-task goal – ‘Do I have time for a coffee before my meeting?’ – whereas explicit-time processing aims to estimate a duration as such», Coull explains. Studies of explicit timing show that two cortical structures, the supplementary motor area, which co-ordinates complex movements, and the right prefrontal cortex, are constantly activated.

It has also been shown that the cerebellum plays a key role in motor tasks requiring perception of implicit timing. Other parts of the brain may be involved in implicit-timing estimates: for example, the left parietal cortex, which manages intended movement, and the left premotor cortex, which plans and organises movement. Sometimes the right prefrontal cortex, usually involved in explicit-timing estimates, is activated for implicit estimates, for instance, when an event does not occur as soon as expected: a traffic light stays red for longer than foreseen. The brain updates its time forecasts, once again anticipating the interval.

In addition, «the regions of the brain involved differ depending on the context, particularly if the stimulus only lasts for a very short time, less than 200 milliseconds,» says Coull. The visual cortex is activated when we estimate the duration of a visual stimulus. In the same way, the primary motor cortex comes into play when a timing estimate is associated with an action, whereas the auditory cortex has a part in estimating the length of a sound stimulus.

Above all, the brain’s perception of time involves processes linked to memory and attention: witness the impression that time is passing more quickly when we are busy, or doing something amusing or exciting. Time flies even when we are in love. In contrast, a watched pot never boils. Minutes drag by when we are bored.

«On account of the joint contribution of memory and attentional processes, processing by the brain of time-related data can only be based on a functional network, rather than a single region. This certainly explains why there are no neurological or psychiatric disorders characterised exclusively by temporal processing deficits,» Coull says.

Dopamine is the main neurotransmitter involved in time processing. Dopamine agonists – compounds that activate dopamine receptors – tend to speed up our perception of time, which passes more quickly. This is also the case for certain drugs, such as cocaine, which enhances the effect of dopamine. On the contrary, the neuroleptics used to treat schizophrenia inhibit its effect, creating the impression that time is passing more slowly.

Recent research by neuro-physiologists and chemists working on time processing is beginning to show how emotions may speed up or slow down our perception of time. In 2011 Professor Droit-Volet and Sandrine Gil, a lecturer on cognition and learning at Poitiers University, France, published a study of how changes in the emotional state of subjects caused by watching films affected their sense of time. The psychologists showed students extracts from films known to induce fear (horror movies such as The Blair Witch Project, Scream, The Shining) or sadness (drama such as City of Angels, Philadelphia or Dangerous Minds). A third category of «neutral» footage (weather forecasts or stock market updates) was also shown. They then asked students to estimate the duration of a visual stimulus.

«Fear distorted time, the stimulus being perceived as longer than it really was,» says Droit-Volet. Fear prompted a state of arousal that speeded up the rate of the internal clock. This state also involved dilated pupils, higher pulse rate, increased blood pressure and muscular contraction. It reflects a defensive mechanism triggered by a threatening situation, as the body prepares to act either by attacking or running away. The psychologists observed a similar tendency to overestimate time in three-year-old children exposed to a threat.

But, «quite unexpectedly, sadness does not affect our perception of time, no doubt because the emotion felt when watching a sad film is not strong enough to slow down physiological functions,» Droit-Volet explains. However, she adds, work is needed on the profound sadness associated with periods of severe depression. Her team is currently looking at whether the internal clock may slow down in healthy subjects who practise meditation and relaxation. Is it possible they may step outside time in this state?

Gil and Droit-Volet have also worked on the perception of time when the face of someone close expresses a secondary emotion such as shame. Seeing someone looking ashamed prompts the observer to understand the cause of this feeling. «This reflective activity distracts attention from time-processing, so that estimated time seems shorter than it really is,» Droit-Volet says. Only after the age of eight, when children have learned the meaning of shame, does this tendency to underestimate time appear.

The theory of embodied mind (or cognition) helps explain how the perception of other people’s emotions changes our sense of time. Embodied cognition hinges on an internal process that mimics or simulates another’s emotional state, enabling us to tune in and understand their feeling. Accordingly, when a teenager spends time with a senior who speaks and walks more slowly, the young person’s internal clock slows down. There is also a subjective slowing of time, which enhances social interaction between the two people.

Droit-Volet and her colleagues have shown that inhibiting this mimicry process by freezing the facial expressions of the observer – simply by putting a pen in their mouth – prevents this empathetic shift. The internal clock remains steady, regardless of the emotion perceived in the other. Other studies have shown that a person who has been «botoxed» has greater difficulty recognising other people’s emotional expressions and is less empathetic towards them.

«Our perception of time is very revealing of our emotional state,» says Droit-Volet, pointing out that temporal distortion caused by emotion is not the result of a malfunction in the internal clock, but on the contrary an illustration of its remarkable ability to adapt to events around us. She adds: «There is no single, uniform time, but rather multiple times which we experience. Our temporal distortions are a direct translation of the way in which our brain and body adapt to these multiple times, the times of life.»

In Durée et Simultanéité, A propos de la théorie d’Einstein (Duration and simultaneity, with reference to Einstein’s theory) the French philosopher Henri Bergson explained that «we must put aside the idea of a single time; all that counts are the multiple times that make up experience». In other words our perception of time is always relative.

This article appeared in Guardian Weekly, which incorporates material from Le Monde