Hearing Time: A Philosophical Exercise

Recognising that everything humans experience occurs within time, this book describes how misunderstandings and even painful consequences arise when time is viewed as an object or resource. Anxiety from a perceived scarcity of time and the pressure of time’s perceived acceleration are among the relatively harmless variants. But psychopathologies such as bipolar disorder or autism have also been described in terms of distortions in time perception.

The book contends that time should be understood as a dimension of events and it is shown how events become meaningful through repetition and variation. The close connection between time, hearing and music is explored in order to explain these general structural characteristics of temporal reality.

The book is not merely a philosophical discourse but also an invitation to experience time anew. It is a book for all those who not only want to read about the conceptual foundations of time, but also want to be motivated to use time wisely. Serenity and prudence, but also irony, are shown to be powerful means to gain autonomy, understood as a specific kind of temporal balance or harmony.

Hearing Time is essential reading for all scholars of metaphysics and aesthetics, especially those focussing on the philosophy of time and the role of time in the experience of art.