Watching the clock, people may believe in one and only one measure of telling time. With the formation of government and society, days, hours, and minutes came to be as well. The standard way of telling time is Newtonian. However, in Stephen Jay Gould’s essay, “Our Allotted Lifetimes”, he introduces Newtonian time as well as geological time (in regards to Earth’s history) and metabolic time. Like the word ‘metabolism’, metabolic is used to describe reactions that maintain life. I am experienced with Newtonian time, metabolic time, and geological time, and they all hold relative importance to me.
Before reading Gould’s essay, I had not previously learned about metabolic time. This term is synonymous with the rate-of-living theory. An organism’s metabolism affects its lifespan; “small mammals breathe fast, but live for a short time” (Gould, 284). According to the text, there is a relationship between the size of a mammal and its ratio of breath time to heartbeat time. The author discusses how…show more content… His example was a mayfly; these bugs stay alive for one day. A day to humans is a lifetime for these bugs. I find this idea to be extremely interesting. Time is a manmade concept, so it differs between animals and even humans. I relate it to driving while listening to music or while reading. The drive from Gilman to Le Grand lasts for twelve minutes, but, with music on, the drive flies by. Reading a book feels the same; I can be reading a book for two hours but it feels closer to half of the time.
Newtonian time is much more familiar to me, compared to metabolic. This is the method of telling time used since I knew how to tell time. My schedule and life revolves around this standard time, so I need a clock to set alarms, arrive on time, and more. Newtonian time determines when school starts, when cross country races start, and when I should sleep. The minutes and hours of a day rule my daily
