What is time?

For my Anthropology class this semester we have weekly field exercises. This past week's required asking four strangers to define time. Not too long ago I would have been totally at a loss if I were the one being asked. Now, however, I'm fairly confident in my answer.

Measured time is how we structure and comprehend our own consciousness. Every human is familiar with the concept of time passing either quickly or slowly depending on the circumstance. "Time flies when you're having fun!" It also flies when you're sleeping, or concentrating. Basically, altering your consciousness alters how you perceive and experience time. This altering of consciousness doesn't have to refer to recreational drug use -- though that can certainly have a profound effect. Your brain produces all sorts of chemicals that affect your perception. Those with depression, for instance, experience time in very strange ways.

So of course not all people experience time in the same way. In order for us to get anything done we needed some sort of standard. Hence, our concept of time, measured in minutes, hours, days, years.

But is time real outside of human experience?

If anything is real outside of human experience -- which is something we can't really prove and is fruitless to argue -- time must be too. The planet rotates and revolves at a regular pace; things live and die. The problem is that time is inseparable from space and matter and the whole package -- the theory of general relativity basically -- is difficult for most of us to wrap our brains around.

But my assignment wasn't to discover the truth of what time really is -- only to find what it means to different people. And in the process I came to find a simple, anthropocentric definition of my own.

College is crazy, honestly.