The Human Body is a Well-Calibrated Timing Machine

The Human Body Is A well calibrated timing machine. At least 3 internal clocks are running every waking second. 12 10 :9 11 12 10 :9 35 7 6 Tapping your foot to music? Add at least two more clocks. Around the clock Environmental cues, like light, turn genes on or off to reset natural clocks. The "CLOCK is too small to be read • At only a portion of the hypothalamus it's smaller than an almond. These rhythms persist in the absence of external cues. • (This is an INTERNAL clock) Circadian Schedule Deepest Sleep Highest Alertness Noon 12:00 2:00 AM 10:00 09:00. 08:30 pi4:30 15:30 10:00 AM 07:30/ owt ye 2:30 PM Best coordination 06:45 17:00 3:30 PM Fastest Reaction Times 06:00- -18:00 18:30 19:00 11:30 PM Bowel movement suppressed 04:30 21:00 02:00 22:30 A New Man: o0:00 Midnight Circadian rhythms are even at work in plant life, like algae. • The circadian rhythms of modern men in industrialized societies do not change for the seasons. Even if bathed in the same amount of artificial light as their male counterparts, the circadian rhythms of women adjust for the light outside. After decades of exposure to artificial light in the workplace male circadian rhythms have been hoodwinked into forgetting their natural path. From minute to minute • How time feels Sometimes a minute can last an eternity, and sometimes an afternoon will fly by. • If our feeling for time is subjective, how are we able to estimate the length of tasks without looking at the clock? Pulses = how the brain measures time • Pulses are archived in your memory and associated with the task at hand. • Caffeine speeds up pulses Sleepiness slows down pulses • Gaussian distribution • Your brain randomly samples the number of pulses that it took to perform an action. Example : Pulse sample of crossing the street 25 pulses, when tired 90 pulses, when caffeinated Mean: 54 pulses 54 pulses could be the feeling of about 30, or 50, or 250 seconds. It all depends on your past memories of crossing the street. 49 53 65 47 Pulse Chart 4. 12 i 2: Your ability to juggle multiple clocks at once enables you, to multitask. :9 3: :8 • Worst case scenario: Imagine you are talking on the phone and driving. You stop at a stop sign and your internal clock does not alert you that you have spent long enough stopped. You remain stopped. • Alzheimer's involves a chemical deficiency that disables the storing of pulses in a timely manner. • This leads to difficulties estimating how long things should take. Sitting in your car waiting for the gas tank to fill up for an hour • You might have an acetylcholine deficiency Multiple clocks Through sampling the pulses of our memories, our brain provides one clock for when we should leave work, and another for how long we should spend jotting out a short email. Splitting seconds • Your brain can't determine • We register what we see 38 milliseconds after what we hear. exactly how long it will take you to cross the street, but it can organize complex series of beeps and flashing lights. • If a light blinks 20 milliseconds before a beep sounds we can put them in the correct order even • Takes well under a second to comprehend a sound or a light. if we register the sound first. Just can't seem to keep track of time? Drugs like marijuana, cocaine, and the antipsychotic haloperidol alter the way we experience time. • With prolonged substance use the brain compensates, essentially overriding our faulty memories. Solitary confinement disrupts multiple internal clocks. • The slamming of steel doors, rounds of guards, and lack of natural light disturb patients circadian rhythms. Daytime alertness and nighttime relaxation shifts to 24 hour in between stupor. • The lack of external stimuli sends prisoners into a "mental fog." • Solitary prisoners become hypersensitive to stimuli • Often become confused as to the order of events. Slowing down of pulses leads to excruciatingly prolonged time And the feeling of extremely rapid-fire events. There is evidence: • With therapy and chemical supplements these developments can be reversed. Citations: http://www.nytimes.com/1995/03/14/science/modern-life-suppresses-an-ancient-body-rhythm.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm http://io9.com/5646561/how-do-you-really-know-what-time-it-is http://law.wustl.edu/journal/22/p325grassian.pdf BestMasterslnPsychology.com 4.