Time is a big part of our lives. We can say that time is our life since it governs absolutely every aspect of it. Being so important, we think you would like to hear some facts about time that will surely blow your mind.

The cosmic clock will always be ticking no matter what, and just think about it for a second. Ask yourself this: How many things about time and how it works do you know?

Most of us don’t know much about time, even though it is constantly in our lives. We want to change this today and present you with some amazing facts about time. Get ready to change your perception of time!

1. The New York minute

Have you ever been to a big city such as New York? If yes, then you might have noticed that the time felt like it was passing somehow differently. Just imagine that you go out in front of Penn Station and are faced with the traffic and the overall lively environment. New York never sleeps! So, get ready to find out one of the most incredible facts about time.

Now let’s see what causes this effect in the big cities. The name of this effect is the “stopped-clock illusion.” You can also notice it happening when you look at the second hand of a traditional analog clock. It might look like time has frozen. The seconds are passing incredibly slowly, and you can’t understand what the cause is.

This occurs because quick eye movements lead people to lose data. The lost data is then “inserted” after the movement, giving the impression that the time somehow lasts longer than usual.

When you are in a big city that is full of lights and cars, your eyes will jump from one stimulus to another, and even if you feel like you spend five minutes looking around, just one minute has passed in New York time.

2. Gravity and the longer days

If we take a look at what researchers have discovered, we can see that more than a billion years ago, the days on Earth used to be shorter. One day would last for 18 hours instead of 24.

Nowadays, we live longer days, all because of the moon. The gravity of our natural satellite has an impact on time because it slows down the Earth’s rotation.

The duration of Earth’s orbit around the sun has not changed, but the number of days in a year has. When dinosaurs were still alive on Earth 70 million years ago, a day was only around 23.5 hours long, and a year was made up of 372 of those somewhat shorter days.

This is one of the facts about time that truly surprised us. It is challenging to think about how much the world has changed and how it keeps changing.

3. The leap second

Since we were talking about the rotation of the Earth, we could not miss telling you about the leap second. There are many facts about time out there, but this one will tell you more about how things influence each other.

The Earth’s rotational speed can be kind of unpredictable. This speed may be easily influenced by big weather systems, atmospheric winds, and the snowy winters in the Northern Hemisphere.

All of this has led to the use of the leap second. The International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service sometimes need to take this leap second in order to reduce the discrepancy between atomic time and astronomical time. This discrepancy can’t be longer than 0.9 seconds.

But how is this affecting us, right? Well, we can’t feel these leap seconds, but they can create mayhem for tech companies. There is no way for developers to include leap seconds in their code because they are added at the most random times. This has led to platform crashes in the past, including LinkedIn and Reddit.

4. Short people experience time differently

This is one of the facts about time that might sound kind of weird, but trust us when we tell you that it is 100% true.

The reasoning behind it is that information travels to your brain at somewhat different speeds even if different parts of your body get it at the same time, according to a neurologist called David Eagleman.

Because we want to explain this better and in a way that is easier to understand, we will use an example. Let’s say that you are on your phone and you are texting someone. At some point, because you are not being careful, you hit your head into a pole, and at the same time you hit your head, you also stub your toe.

You might believe that you feel the pain from both injuries at the same time, but in reality, the pain from your head will reach your brain faster. There is a small delay, but if you are shorter, the information will need less time to travel to the brain, and this makes shorter people live in a more accurate version of time.

5. Has time ever slowed down for you?

It is not that uncommon to hear stories about how time slowed down in an instant and how everything began moving in slow motion. Generally, these stories are told by people who have been in life-threatening situations, and because of this, research has been conducted to find out what’s up with this phenomenon.

The group that was part of the study was asked to look at a series of images of numbers that were flashed before their eyes. The speed was increased, and they had to tell when they were not able to distinguish the numbers anymore.

After a baseline was set, the participants had to do the same task, but something changed. They had to do it while they were being dropped from a 150-foot tower. Another group was assigned to watch those who were falling and calculate how long the fall lasted.

The participants who were dropped from the tower estimated that their fall lasted for longer. More exactly, with 36% longer. That means that those who watched them estimated that the fall lasted 36% less.

Time didn’t slow down; rather, it was our memories of it, especially because none of them could remember the exact numbers, that caused them to feel as though it was passing more slowly.

So, what causes this effect of slow motion is that our memories are the ones that make terrifying moments last forever. Did you know about this one of the facts about time?

6. Time is slower than it used to be

As you can see, there are many facts about time that can help you understand the world we live in. For example, dark energy is a constant presence in the physics world, but no one knows what it is. Yes, we can see the effect of this energy, but we don’t know what it is.

A team of experts from the University of Salamanca in Spain has made a bold declaration that surprised us all. They claim that since dark energy doesn’t exist, all of our attempts to find and understand it have been in vain.

But if it doesn’t exist, how can it affect us, right? They say that time is only slowing down on its path to a full stop. This is what explains all of the effects of dark energy, according to their alternative theory.

According to their research, our universe will eventually freeze in place. We know that this sounds like a grim prediction, but don’t worry because this event is far away from us. If this ever happens, it will be in a billion years.

Since you probably value time, you might want to wake up early. An alarm clock is something that can help you with this: Yaboodn Digital Alarm Clock for Bedrooms, 6.5 inch LED Display with White Digits

You should also read: These 7 Surprising Facts About the World Will Change Your Perception of Time!