Our Lives Are Ruled The Illusion Of Time

Short Wave

NPR

Daily News, Nature, Life Sciences, Astronomy, Science, News

4.7 • 6K Ratings

🗓️ 15 January 2024

⏱️ 16 minutes

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Summary

Time is a concept so central to our daily lives. Yet, the closer scientists look at it, the more it seems to fall apart. Time ticks by differently at sea level than it does on a mountaintop. The universe's expansion slows time's passage. "And some scientists think time might not even be 'real' — or at least not fundamental," says NPR science correspondent Geoff Brumfiel. In this encore episode, Geoff joins Short Wave Scientist in Residence Regina G. Barber to bend our brains with his learnings about the true nature of time. Along the way, we visit the atomic clocks at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, consider distant exploding stars and parse the remains of subatomic collisions.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to Shortwave from NPR.
0:05.0	Hey Short Waivers, Regina Barbara here.
0:07.0	So our world seems like it's designed to help us stay on time.
0:11.0	It's right there on all of our devices. And you could still
0:14.9	call a phone number if you want to. I mean I don't know if you remember Gina but
0:18.5	that was the way we used to get the time. I actually do, like barely. I
0:22.0	remember calling maybe once in my childhood
0:24.1	Eastern Standard time 13 hours 54 minutes and yet even though it's easy to tell what time it is
0:30.9	it's not so easy to tell what time actually is, which is where NPR Science
0:36.4	Correspondent Jeff Brumfield comes in. Yeah that's right I've been on a bit of a
0:40.7	quest to figure out the truth about time and I'm here to tell you that it's far
0:45.8	more flexible than I realized. And some scientists think it might not even be real. Time might not be
0:51.6	fundamental. This has been going on for like decades,
0:55.0	that there have been these hints coming up
0:57.0	that space and time aren't fundamental properties of the universe,
1:00.0	and they're just not telling anyone about it.
1:02.0	Wait, what?
1:04.0	I don't know what to believe anymore if space and time aren't fundamental properties of the universe.
1:10.0	Yes.
1:11.0	But today, Jeff, you're going to help us. Today we revisit your time episode and ask where does the time we use in our daily lives come from?
1:19.0	How is it different from true time in the universe?
1:22.0	And if time isn't a thing time in the universe?
	...

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