Another theory on why time seems to go more quickly as we get older
This:
Time is happening in the mind’s eye. It is related to the number of mental images the brain encounters and organizes and the state of our brains as we age. When we get older, the rate at which changes in mental images are perceived decreases because of several transforming physical features, including vision, brain complexity, and later in life, degradation of the pathways that transmit information. And this shift in image processing leads to the sense of time speeding up.
Perhaps that’s part of it.
But I believe the larger part of it is a combination of other factors. The first is that as we age each passing unit of time becomes a smaller and smaller percentage of the amount of time we’ve already lived. The second is that we are quite aware that the number of days we have left on earth is growing shorter and may even be quite short, as opposed to an earlier perception that we have lots and lots of time left. The third is the absence of novelty in the lives of many people as they grow old; the days all tend to blur together.
Time flies when you’re having fun. Also, when you get older.
I make a list each evening of things I plan to accomplish the next day. Otherwise it is too easy to spend the day roaming the blogosphere, reading books, and watching TV. When your physical abilities become more limited, it’s too easy to just let things go. Today I plan to blow detritus from a recent storm off our driveway/sidewalk, go to the Navy Exchange to get my hair cut and buy coffee, stop by Lowe’s to pick up a new door mat, and do a mile or so walk around our neighborhood. (It’s not raining here today. Whoopee!) Pushing myself to do various chores each day, creates activity and changes up my routine. Don’t know if it makes time seem to pass more slowly but it adds some change and gives me something to look forward to.
We’re planning to go to Hawaii for a couple of weeks in February. A nice change from the winter clouds and drizzle here in the People’s Republic of Puget Sound and something to look forward to.
The days are dwindling down to a precious few. Why not try to make the best of them even if they are passing much too quickly?
J.J.:
Sounds like you’ve got a good system going there. Have fun in Hawaii!
Goes with the quote i sent in response to your emai…
nice of you to put it up… not
its the whole freaking point of the song and the longest record on the charts.
Pink Floyd – Time (Lyrics included) – YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rL3AgkwbYgo
So you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it’s sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again.
The sun is the same in a relative way but you’re older,
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death.
Every year is getting shorter never seem to find the time.
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way
The time is gone, the song is over,
Thought I’d something more to say.
When can we cover the 50,000 children without parents?
or
China, Taiwan: Xi Jinping warns Beijing could take Taipei by force
World War 3 FEARS: China threatens to RETAKE Taiwan
Admiral Davidson warns: ‘Only war can stop China’
South China Sea: Philippines threatens war
[have to wait for it to start, talking about it before, well thats nuts!]
US warns of ability to take down Chinese artificial islands
or
U.S. Can’t Fight Two Wars at the Same Time Anymore – 2012
One in five Army generals were not cleared for combat in 2016
Suicide rate of female military veterans is called ‘staggering’ [dont care about the men eva]
or
Study: Most Young Americans Aren’t Fit For Military Service
The Vast Majority Of Americans In Their 20s Are Unfit For Military Service
71% of U.S. Youth Don’t Qualify for Military Service, Pentagon
or
Proof That Military Chips From China Are Infected? | Military.com
Backdoor Found In China-Made US Military Chip?
Chinese Military Reportedly Snuck Spy Chips Onto U.S. Server
or
how dems spent 30 billion on a replacement wall SBINET from boing
Boeing virtual fence: $30 billion failure
The last time the United States tried to build a virtual border wall
Homeland Security Junks Billion Dollar ‘Virtual Fence’ | WIRED
[nice part about this is it may stop individuals, but if military did something, it would be wide open… not that Venzeula has the ability to make Dragunov rivles, aks, and more.. oh wait, they do]
or
[all below was set up last year, no one here talked as if its one world, one time…]
Satellite photos reveal Russian forces on Ukraine border
Russia Sent Thousands of Troops, Weapons to West Border
Russia building up military sites across Polish border:
Norway wants 700 US troops deployed nearer Russia border
Former defense chief sees a serious Russian threat against Norway’s
Russia announces extraordinary missile tests close to Latvia’s sea
Russian Military to Launch Drills That Could Defeat NATO Forces in baltic
Satellite images show potential Russian military buildup near Baltics
Putin planning to send 100K troops to Baltic border
or
Chinese Troops On Border With India
India increases deployment of troops along border with China
North Korea photos of China border show potential military activity
or
the more than 200 assasinations?
or
This New Russian Rocket Could Be a True Tank-Killer
Russia has just revealed a freakishly powerful arsenal of hypersonic missiles.
The US has been forced to admit it can’t do anything about them.
Russia deploys new laser weapon
Russian missile identified as anti-satellite weapon
have to love their new nuclear armed torpedo
flexible, low-yield, non-strategic nuclear weapons.
The Poseidon / Kanjon nuclear torpedo
and
The 9M730 Burevestnik (Russian: ???????????; “Petrel”, NATO reporting name SSC-X-9 Skyfall) is a Russian nuclear-powered, nuclear-tipped cruise missile with virtually unlimited range
Kanyon “Canyon” Kanjon torpedo – a “new intercontinental, nuclear armed, nuclear-powered, undersea autonomous torpedo”
The Poseidon weapon is designed to create a tsunami wave up to 500 metres (1,600 ft) tall
[that would be large enough to wash away manhatten, washington, los angeles, florida… and if its slow… swimming like a fluke, crawling on the bottom.. you could put 50 of them in palce and no one would know… wheeee!!!]
there is tons more we are IGNORING..
have a great weekend..
sleep well…
It hurts me deeply every holiday when i go home and see my parents have aged considerably since the last time i was home.
Fact is time doesn’t fly, time is eternal, it is just that our life is very short. think back how short 1 year truly is and on average most of us only have 80 of that to live. feels like Christmas was yesterday and we are almost February and the next thanksgiving feels like its around the corner.
It is amazing to me how young civilization truly is when it is only 6000 times of these short unit of time called year long.
One of the most delightful parts of raising children is seeing them experience the world as I did when I was a child. I do get a sort of mental double vision though.
I’m amazed at things my son remembers (he 6) from when he was much much younger. I remember as a child remembering more and further back than I do now.
(These things he remembers are things he remembers that I don’t, it’s not a question of him remembering retellings.)
I have heard that old people remember much more of their childhood, but I’m suppose I’m curious how they would know they are remembering things that actually happened.
The passage of time is a constant. It is our perception of time which is susceptible to change.
Interesting article; thanks.
It would mean that what we experience as the passage of time, how it seems to us, are effects — “symptoms” — of the way the brain obtains and “processes” “information.”
That would be true of any theory about the way we perceive the passage of time that is based on the physics of the brain.
I have no problem with that, but then I believe that the best way to understand a human individual (or any life-form, for that matter) is as an entire system, founded on a physical substrate and including all the effects, emotions, thoughts, images, “mental” acts and conditions such as “acts of will” and consciousness itself, that arise out of that physical mechanism and the interactions that go on within it.
“The whole is more than the sum of its parts.”
“Seems”, madam? Nay, it is. I know not “seems”. Hamlet.
I suspect time actually does go faster as one ages rather than seems to. At least that is the universal human experience.
And time changes all things except that within us that is surprised by time changing. (? Source).
A propos nothing, I was visited last evening by a Red-winged Fairy Wren. They only exist in my bailiwick. Exquisite moment, time stood still!
It has always been my thought that our perception of time is inversely related to our metabolisms. Children, with their fast metabolisms, perceive time as glacially slow. As we age our metabolism slows and we perceive time flowing faster.
Time actually does flow at different rates for different observers, but you have to be moving at relativistic velocities for it to do so. Special Relativity shows how this happens.
Red-winged Fairy Wren. That sounds so magical. I’m glad it’s real.
Time flies, you say? Ah,
No.
Alas, time stays—
We go.