Time Out of Mind by Stefan Klein
IN 1784, Benjamin Franklin composed a satire, "Essay on Daylight Saving," proposing a law that would oblige Parisians to get up an hour earlier in summer. By putting the daylight to better use, he reasoned, they'd save a good deal of money -- 96 million livres tournois -- that might otherwise go to buying candles. Now this switch to daylight saving time (which occurs early Sunday [3/9/2008]] in the United States) is an annual ritual in Western countries...
...But the quest to spend time the way we do money is doomed to failure, because the time we experience bears little relation to time as read on a clock. The brain creates its own time, and it is this inner time, not clock time, that guides our actions. In the space of an hour, we can accomplish a great deal -- or very little.
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