Circles or Arrows
We pay homage to the idea that time flows in circles with every birthday party. After all, does not an anniversary always return on the same day every year? We believe in safe return of more of the same. We pay homage to the idea of time as an arrow flying in a straight line with every pencilled line on a door frame. How tall is a child? The lines go up. We believe in challenging progress, and in the unexpected arrival of the unknown unknowns.
We balance these beliefs in our inner monologue. After every birthday party, we conclude that we move in circles. The circles are connected, so our lives spiral towards their ends. After looking back at how tall children were a year or two ago, we conclude that life is a linear flight of an arrow. There is more of us every year, and everything around us changes and evolves. Most of us balance these two beliefs without much ado. Imagine that we have to choose. To vote. To participate in a referendum on global time management by the United Nations. You have to click either “circle” or “arrow”. What would you do?
I would not know what to do. If we plan to cook a meal or to build an intelligent bot, it is probably better to manage the flow of time as if it were an arrow. If we want to educate a student or to be happy, it is probably better to circle. Hold on. Does it matter at all? Well, it does. Let us put it in a nutshell, without going nuts.
Asking abstract questions used to be a privilege of the elites. The past tense is correct. Access to the streamed everything undermined the authorities, even the temporary ones. A liking for a taste in musical styles, and belief in theories in quantum physics, go up and down at the invisible, implicit, networked and worldwide stock exchange. Truth by referendum? Yes, after all, democracy means a share in traded futures, doesn’t it?
Haarlem, June 26, 2026