Big Data and associated new technologies are changing our way of communicating and perceiving reality. The flow of information and the mass sharing of ideas and acquaintances are changing our idea and perception of time and space. The concept of time in particular is one of the main paradigms for every society. It strongly influences the way we draw, shape and perceive our sojourn in the universe. Each culture has developed a different idea of time, and Big Data is creating a new sense of time in our contemporary society.
We perceive the idea of time as a clear, fundamental and absolute concept, something simple, a uniform flow measured by clocks. In reality the nature of time is still one of the greatest mysteries [of human perception]. Research in quantum physics have taught us that there are many different forms of time, as every point in space has a different time.
Internet, social networks, big data, artificial intelligence, robotics and the overall technological revolution, are changing our sense of time. Paradoxically new technologies are developing an idea of time similar to the one suggested by quantum physics: a system of relation more than a system of things.
"We can think of the world as constituted of things.... Or think that the world is made up of events. Of processes. Of something that happens. Which does not last, which is continually transforming " (Carlo Rovelli, The Order of Time, Adelphi, 2017 )
This is exactly where new technologies are bringing us, by transforming the perception of the world around us from “a world of things” to “a world of processes”. Just like science, new technologies are transforming absolute parameters like time into a fluid and relative parameters. Universal time has shattered into a myriad of proper times, like space has been shattered into a myriad of individual spaces and virtual community spaces.
The acceleration of data production processes and data exchange brings the network system closer to that of neuronal processes similarly to how the acceleration towards an absence of present is shaping a new concept of time. It could be said that the model of universe, mind and processes of social interactions are overlapping thanks to a new idea of time, or rather, an absence of time.
The installation Conversation on Time wants to invite visitors to reflect on the idea of time and how our perception of reality has changed through Big Data and associated new technologies. The idea of time in science is compared with three Greek concepts of time (Chronos, Kairos, Aion). In a multi-screen projection, the installation aims at approaching the idea of time from three different perspectives: human time, earth time and universe time.
The installation contains a film about the concept of time for which artist Maria Rebecca Ballestra edited a poetic text, expressly created for the project by the UK poet Mario Petrucci, a Big Data visualisation, and a text by JRC scientist Nikolas Stilianiakis.