Or in this case, time itself.
Time is of the essence. We have heard this saying for years, but it hasn’t been more true than it is now. In today’s society, time seems to move much more quickly and too many people note that there aren’t enough hours in the day. In this awesome animated video, “The Secret Powers of Time,” Professor Philip Zimbardo (famous for his Stanford prison experiment and research on evil) takes on a lighter subject and reminds us that time affects who we are, how we think, how we live, and much more.
Watch his lecture and reflect on how time is shaping you. Ask yourself:
- Am I focused on the past, present or future?
- Who am I becoming today?
- Who do I want to be?
- Am I where I want to be? Am I moving ahead or am I stuck?
Tags: Viral Video
Posted in Life of Meaning, Science & Research
Great find! I’ve noticed different cultures’ paces of time before, like when taking a train from Italy (slow) to Switzerland (fast), but I’d never thought about why or the generational element. At the end, he starts talking about how lots of conflicts w/ people are just different conflicts in time perspectives – it’d be interesting to see some examples of that.
Really interesting. Love the animation. The part about dropout rates struck me, though. While he mentions it as only one of the problems, I would be interested to see exactly how big a role it plays. I, actually, wouldn’t think video games would play a large factor in whether or not a child drops out. He provides interesting statistics for dropout rates and time spent playing video games, but none that really show how the two are related. It would seem to me there are much larger factors that influence a child’s inability to thrive in school – such as family support, location, socioeconomic status. I’d also be interested to see if video game playing habits are uniform across socioeconomic groupings.
But I definitely agree there has been a fundamental shift in the perception of time and that it has had an impact on behavior. I can certainly say I am a future-oriented person that dwells on the potential consequences of my actions – real or perceived. I have also, sadly, been known to get annoyed at the time it takes my computer to boot up.
I moved from a Catholic country to a Protestant one (the US) ten years ago. A few years ago I realized I used to be present-oriented and switched to be future-oriented. I’m not sure if I stayed in a protestant country because it carries my values of time or if my values of time changed because of my environment.
Upon my last trip to Europe last month, I kept telling my father (a busy CEO) about his wasting precious minutes doing yard work and doing house stuff himself where his time would be much better used in what he’s best at doing. After a few days or talking about time, I realized that I was totally hung up on the value of time, because I have come to change my time perspective so much.
Morale: the environment in which you live really changed my value of time, as the video demonstrate.
What an amazing way to present information! Captures visual and auditory learners in one fell swoop. It is also a great method to use to review your own talks….meaning, if your talk/lecture/presentation skips from topic to topic with nothing connecting one issue to another, you will see that right away inthe drawings.
I think also one’s age contributes to how we think about time.
When I was a kid I thought that knowing what time it was a special ability that I’d acquire when I grew up. I marveled that grownups always seemed to know what time it was. Bedtime! Time to go to school! I guess in a way I was right. We learn to superficially “tell time” by reading the hands on the clock. But as I grow older, I’m acutely aware of time physically passing and it feels like the days and months are getting shorter.
Remember those endless summer afternoons when you were a kid? Time stretched forever then. I miss that.