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Our brains are terrible clocks. An hour can pass like a few minutes, a day can drag on for what seems like two. Because of that, we’re not always sure that time is real – is it just a label we’ve stuck onto the observed patterns of our universe? We can’t see, feel, or hear time, we can only see its effect on us and on things over the course of our lives. Bill Nye believes its both subjective and objective – there is something definitively measurable to time, and yet it’s so mysterious to our brains. Nye thinks (or hopes) that in his lifetime, a new discovery will be made about the nature of time and space-time that gives us some more answers about this curiosity-inducing fourth dimension. Bill Nye’s most recent book is Unstoppable: Harnessing Science to Change the World.
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BILL NYE:
Bill Nye, scientist, engineer, comedian, author, and inventor, is a man with a mission: to help foster a scientifically literate society, to help people everywhere understand and appreciate the science that makes our world work. Making science entertaining and accessible is something Bill has been doing most of his life.
In Seattle Nye began to combine his love of science with his flair for comedy, when he won the Steve Martin look-alike contest and developed dual careers as an engineer by day and a stand-up comic by night. Nye then quit his day engineering day job and made the transition to a night job as a comedy writer and performer on Seattle’s home-grown ensemble comedy show “Almost Live.” This is where “Bill Nye the Science Guy®” was born. The show appeared before Saturday Night Live and later on Comedy Central, originating at KING-TV, Seattle’s NBC affiliate.
While working on the Science Guy show, Nye won seven national Emmy Awards for writing, performing, and producing. The show won 18 Emmys in five years. In between creating the shows, he wrote five children’s books about science, including his latest title, “Bill Nye’s Great Big Book of Tiny Germs.”
Nye is the host of three currently-running television series. “The 100 Greatest Discoveries” airs on the Science Channel. “The Eyes of Nye” airs on PBS stations across the country.
Bill’s latest project is hosting a show on Planet Green called “Stuff Happens.” It’s about environmentally responsible choices that consumers can make as they go about their day and their shopping. Also, you’ll see Nye in his good-natured rivalry with his neighbor Ed Begley. They compete to see who can save the most energy and produce the smallest carbon footprint. Nye has 4,000 watts of solar power and a solar-boosted hot water system. There’s also the low water use garden and underground watering system. It’s fun for him; he’s an engineer with an energy conservation hobby.
Nye is currently the Executive Director of The Planetary Society, the world’s largest space interest organization.
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TRANSCRIPT:
Alicia: Do you think time is real? For example, sometimes an hour can feel very short and sometimes it can feel very long depending on your perception. So then is time subjective? If it’s a measurement of something what is it a measurement of? I’d really like to know your thoughts about time. Thank you.
Bill Nye: Alicia, that is fantastic. Notice that in English we don’t have any other word for time except time. It’s unique. It’s this wild fourth dimension in nature. This is one dimension, this is one detention, this is one dimension and time is the fourth dimension. And we call it the fourth dimension not just in theoretical physics but in engineering. I worked on four dimensional auto pilots so you tell where you want to go and what altitude it is above sea level and then when you want to get there. Like you can’t get there at any time. We have a whole bunch of other words. We have appointments. We have morning, afternoon, evening, noon time. We have a whole bunch of words describing periods of time, but when it comes to actual time we just have this one word it’s a strange and surprising thing.
So along this line, in my opinion, which as you know is correct, I’m kidding, in my opinion time is both subjective and objective. What we do in science and engineering and in life, astronomy, is measure time as carefully as we can because it’s so important to our every day world. You go to plant crops you want to know…
Read the full transcript at https://bigthink.com/videos/hey-bill-nye-is-time-real