The Creation of Artificial Time

We all know our world has sped up to a frenetic pace. We feel it in our bones, not to mention on the freeway. But it hasn’t always been this way.

Let me nerd out on you for a few minutes just to show you how we got here. We’ll talk about the Roman sundial, Saint Benedict, Thomas Edison, your toaster, 1960s sci-fi, 7-Eleven, and, naturally, Steve Jobs.

First, the sundial, aka the original Casio.

As far back as approximately 200 BC,[i] people were com­plaining about what this “new” technology was doing to society. The Roman playwright Plautus turned anger into…