The Relative Understanding of Time

“The same drop of water which we have taken as an example can serve for a clearer understanding of this thought of mine.

“Although in the sense of general Universal Objectivity, the whole period of the process of the flow of Time in that same drop of water is for the whole of it subjective, yet for the beings existing in the drop of water itself, the said given flow of Time is perceived by them as objective.

“For the clarification of this, those beings called ‘hypochondriacs’ can serve, who exist among the three-brained beings of the planet Earth which has taken your fancy.

“To these terrestrial hypochondriacs it very often seems that Time passes infinitely slowly and long, and, as they express themselves, ‘it-drags-phenomenally-tediously.’

“And so, exactly in the same way, it might also sometimes seem to some of the infinitesimal beings existing in that drop of water—assuming, of course, that there happen to be such hypochondriacs among them—that Time drags very slowly and ‘phenomenally-tediously.’

“But actually from the point of view of the sensation of the duration of Time by your favorites of the planet Earth, the whole length of the existence of the ‘beings-Microcosmoses’ lasts only a few of their ‘minutes’ and sometimes even only a few of their ‘seconds.’

“Now, in order that you may still better understand Time and its peculiarities, we may as well compare your age with the corresponding age of a being existing on that planet Earth.

“And for this comparing of ours we too must take the same standard unit of Time, which, as I have already told you, Objective Science employs for such calculations.

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