July 25, 2025 • 15 mins
George Noory and author Tim Swartz discuss the human mind's perception of time.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now here's a highlight from coast to coast AM on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
What's so mysterious about time?
Speaker 3 (00:07):
Oh well, what isn't mysterious about time? You know, time's
an enigma. It stands as an immovable wall that's forever
teasiness with its permanence. Once an event occurs, there's no
way to reverse it. That's why people mankind has grappled
(00:31):
with the constant thought if only I had acted differently,
But time make sure that that doesn't happen, or does it.
I mean, we have seen throughout history events that seem
to show that time for certain individuals can act differently.
(00:57):
You can get things like time slips, missing times, or
on rare occurrences added time. So it's just a forever
mystery so far with us whether or not whether or
not time is something that can be looked at purely
(01:18):
in science and physics, or if it involves something else.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Some physics physicists will tell us that time started when
the universe started, that there was no time before that.
What do you think of that?
Speaker 3 (01:34):
Mm hmm, yeah, whether the theory has it that, you know,
with the Big Bang, time expanded outward along with the
universe and that that earrow of time, that part of
time that forever keeps us moving forwards, kind of like
(01:54):
a river, like we're stuck on a raft on a
river that's constantly moving to the future, and that when
the time comes, when the universe runs out of energy
and the last proton disappears into the darkness, time will
end as well.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Does that mean that's history for all of us?
Speaker 4 (02:19):
Well, it could be, But as time goes by, physicists
are learning that there is probably a lot more to
the universe.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Than what has been described by the Big Bang theory,
and that time may actually be an emergent property from
someplace else in our universe, meaning that our universe is
just a smaller part of a much larger universe and
(02:52):
that's where time emerges from. So basically, for us, time
is an illusion. Those of us who were caught up
in three dimensional space, I should say.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Tim, why does it feel like time sometimes for so
many people just zooms by, goes by, so done fast.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
To me?
Speaker 3 (03:16):
I think that that is an important observation to show
that consciousness has the ability to manipulate time. Maybe the
two are intertwined in such a way that you can't
really have one without the other. And I know what
you mean, George. You know, when you're having a really
(03:38):
good time, when you're having fun and not focused really
on anything, time just seems to shoot by, yep. But
then there are other times, you know, when you're just
in a slog, and it's almost like time reverses itself
and starts going backwards. Now is that a real fact
(04:00):
or is it just something that your you know, that
your mind is manipulating. And that's one of the things
amongst many that physicists are trying to find out, you know,
whether or not our consciousness does have a direct impact
on time.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
I would doodle when I was in school when a
teacher was saying something that I was bored with, and
I wrote one day nineteen sixty, which was the year
I was ten, and I just put nineteen sixty, and
then I drew an arrow under it to the year
two thousand, and that year looked so far away. Now
(04:41):
I look back and it was twenty five years ago.
It doesn't stop.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Nope.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
That's again, that is the confounding thing about time. No
matter what you do, you can't get off, you know,
stop time. I want to get off, but that doesn't happen.
You know, it's it's one of the most familiar, yet
one of the most mysterious of the basic concept of
the human mind. You know, and because of that, time
(05:12):
has fascinating as fascinating man since the dawn of civilization.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Tell us about the great scientist Nicola Tesla. He had
a life changing event that changed his view on time.
What happened to him?
Speaker 1 (05:27):
He did?
Speaker 3 (05:27):
He did well. You know Nikola Tesla, the person who
is responsible really for our modern technology. You know, he
was the inventor of the ac motor, amongst other things.
The guy he was, He was the guy. And when
(05:50):
in one of his laboratories in Manhattan in the very
late nineteenth century, and this was this was a story
that he told a local reporter that they were experimenting
with one of his Tesla coils. You know, that's one
of those giant apparatus that can create lightning bolts. I mean,
(06:12):
you've seen it on the TV. And they had what
was called a magnifying transmitter, which meant that the electricity
coming out of it was stronger than the electricity going
in test during one of these experiments, was struck by
an errant a bolt of electricity, and even though he
(06:38):
was grounded, he said that when he was struck by
this bolt, he had an experience where it felt like
that he had been catapulted outside of time and space.
Now this isn't his own words, and this was long
before you know, science had even started to try to
(07:02):
conceptualize what time was. But Tesla felt like that he
could see both the past, the present, and the future
all at the same time, and that for a brief
instant he had a perfect understanding on the way that
the universe was working. And unfortunately for us, his assistant,
(07:24):
who was with him and was on the ball, was
able to use the two by four to knock him
out of this electrical arc. Else, you know, he eventually
would have fried. But after this experience, and he said
that once he was out of it, then all of this,
all of this perception that he was that he was receiving,
just vanished, and it left him with the knowledge that
(07:50):
there was more going on with the universe than he
could that he could even you know, conceptualize in the
normal physical world. And because of that, he developed a
lifelong interest in trying to develop his own unified field theory.
Much like Einstein was working on and around you know,
this the same time, and all of that was based
(08:13):
on Tesla's accident and his idea that time was non existent,
that the past, the present, and future all exists at
the same time. It's it's it's difficult for our three
dimensional brains to understand that. But Tesla was probably one
(08:34):
of the first outside of you know, Eastern philosophers to
develop this idea that that time and space, first of all,
are one. That was something that Einstein then later brought
into brought into a theory.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
But that.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
Our perceptions of time moving forward is an illusion. Why
it's an illusion no one has really been able to
work out yet, Probably because we evolved in the three
dimensional world and you know, in the material plane and
anything beyond that we would not be able to survive.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
You know.
Speaker 3 (09:18):
We we evolved to avoid that sabertoothed tiger hiding in
the bushes. You know, if if you did not have
this constantly moving arrow moving forward in time as a species,
we would have died a long time ago. So that's
one of the mysteries of time that that Tesla started
(09:41):
to contemplate. It's so long ago and we're still trying
to work it out.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
What are some of your favorite stories that revolve around
time issues.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
Oh gosh, there's so many. You know, it's it's these,
you know, these personal anecdotes that people have come to
me over the years. You know. This Weird Time Exploring
the Mysteries of Time and Space is actually the third
book that I have written about time. It is constantly
(10:15):
a fascinating subject, and every time I put out one book,
I start getting letters from people telling me their own
personal experiences. And George, I had one of myself when
I was a kid that I haven't talked about a lot,
but it evolved a time slip when I was about
(10:38):
sixteen years old, and I have to admit this is
one of my own favorite stories because I know it happened.
You cannot you cannot tear me away with the idea
that something weird hadn't happened. And with a friend, we
had a flat tire while out of the country. This
(11:00):
was this was my dad's old station wagon, and so
we were trying to use, you know, like one of
those old fashioned attire jacks, and it wouldn't We were
parked on the shoulder and it wouldn't grab because of
the gravel, you know, it kept slipping, and we had
we had parked in front of an old farmhouse, and
(11:22):
from this farmhouse came this guy who brought us a
piece of flop plywood that we were then able to
jam under the jack to uh to give it a
base and change the tire and be on our way.
Well later my mom found out this story. Tried not
to tell them what had happened, but she found out
(11:44):
anyway and insisted that I bring this guy, I can't
remember that it was a pie or a cake something
like that, to thank him for helping us. I could
not then find this house. I knew exactly where it was,
was very familiar with the highway, the you know, the
country highway we were on. The house was gone. The
(12:07):
closest I could find to it was that I remember
that when we were originally stuck in front of it,
that it had old fashioned teacup rose bushes on either
side of the sidewalk that led from their front door
to the highway. I found a place that had these
(12:27):
teacup roses, now wild, but there was no house.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Did somebody and cart it away?
Speaker 3 (12:37):
It? It seems like it. And this was just in
less than a week's time. Maybe, but I could not
find this house. Maybe ye never there. I don't know
was it? Was it a ghostly experience? Was it a
time slip? I don't know it it it? You know
(12:57):
this happened when I was sixteen. I'm sixty seven now,
and this will always stay in my mind, wondering what
exactly happened that sunny afternoon.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
Explain what a time slip is.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
Then, A time slip is an experience that most of
the time it's an individual, but like in my case,
you know, I had a friend with me. It's where
it seems like that you have exited present time and
have entered another time. As simple as that, either a
(13:34):
past event or some people reported future events. The things
around you are seen to change. If, say, like you're
walking down a sidewalk, that sidewalk will change from concrete
to bricks. You'll start Instead of cars on the road,
(13:56):
there'll be horse drawn carriages. Skyscrapers will disappear, replaced by
brick buildings no more than just a couple of stories high.
You'll have all the sensory experiences. You can smell and
feel what's going on around you, and it appears like
(14:19):
that you have actually entered a past, our, future time.
It's often overwhelming to the people who have these experiences,
and then just as quickly it ends. It's it's like
almost like a reversed ghostly experience where instead of seeing
an individual phantasm, all of reality around you changes. And
(14:46):
it's a mysterious event that a lot of scientists don't
want to talk about, but it does make you wonder
whether or not that, as Einstein said, that time actually
has like currents and ebbs and flows around it that
(15:07):
can take you onto little sidetracks, maybe briefly into the past,
maybe briefly into the future.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at
one a m Eastern and go to Coast to coastam
dot com for more
Now here's a highlight from coast to coast AM on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
What's so mysterious about time?
Speaker 3 (00:07):
Oh well, what isn't mysterious about time? You know, time's
an enigma. It stands as an immovable wall that's forever
teasiness with its permanence. Once an event occurs, there's no
way to reverse it. That's why people mankind has grappled
(00:31):
with the constant thought if only I had acted differently,
But time make sure that that doesn't happen, or does it.
I mean, we have seen throughout history events that seem
to show that time for certain individuals can act differently.
(00:57):
You can get things like time slips, missing times, or
on rare occurrences added time. So it's just a forever
mystery so far with us whether or not whether or
not time is something that can be looked at purely
(01:18):
in science and physics, or if it involves something else.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Some physics physicists will tell us that time started when
the universe started, that there was no time before that.
What do you think of that?
Speaker 3 (01:34):
Mm hmm, yeah, whether the theory has it that, you know,
with the Big Bang, time expanded outward along with the
universe and that that earrow of time, that part of
time that forever keeps us moving forwards, kind of like
(01:54):
a river, like we're stuck on a raft on a
river that's constantly moving to the future, and that when
the time comes, when the universe runs out of energy
and the last proton disappears into the darkness, time will
end as well.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Does that mean that's history for all of us?
Speaker 4 (02:19):
Well, it could be, But as time goes by, physicists
are learning that there is probably a lot more to
the universe.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Than what has been described by the Big Bang theory,
and that time may actually be an emergent property from
someplace else in our universe, meaning that our universe is
just a smaller part of a much larger universe and
(02:52):
that's where time emerges from. So basically, for us, time
is an illusion. Those of us who were caught up
in three dimensional space, I should say.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Tim, why does it feel like time sometimes for so
many people just zooms by, goes by, so done fast.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
To me?
Speaker 3 (03:16):
I think that that is an important observation to show
that consciousness has the ability to manipulate time. Maybe the
two are intertwined in such a way that you can't
really have one without the other. And I know what
you mean, George. You know, when you're having a really
(03:38):
good time, when you're having fun and not focused really
on anything, time just seems to shoot by, yep. But
then there are other times, you know, when you're just
in a slog, and it's almost like time reverses itself
and starts going backwards. Now is that a real fact
(04:00):
or is it just something that your you know, that
your mind is manipulating. And that's one of the things
amongst many that physicists are trying to find out, you know,
whether or not our consciousness does have a direct impact
on time.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
I would doodle when I was in school when a
teacher was saying something that I was bored with, and
I wrote one day nineteen sixty, which was the year
I was ten, and I just put nineteen sixty, and
then I drew an arrow under it to the year
two thousand, and that year looked so far away. Now
(04:41):
I look back and it was twenty five years ago.
It doesn't stop.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Nope.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
That's again, that is the confounding thing about time. No
matter what you do, you can't get off, you know,
stop time. I want to get off, but that doesn't happen.
You know, it's it's one of the most familiar, yet
one of the most mysterious of the basic concept of
the human mind. You know, and because of that, time
(05:12):
has fascinating as fascinating man since the dawn of civilization.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Tell us about the great scientist Nicola Tesla. He had
a life changing event that changed his view on time.
What happened to him?
Speaker 1 (05:27):
He did?
Speaker 3 (05:27):
He did well. You know Nikola Tesla, the person who
is responsible really for our modern technology. You know, he
was the inventor of the ac motor, amongst other things.
The guy he was, He was the guy. And when
(05:50):
in one of his laboratories in Manhattan in the very
late nineteenth century, and this was this was a story
that he told a local reporter that they were experimenting
with one of his Tesla coils. You know, that's one
of those giant apparatus that can create lightning bolts. I mean,
(06:12):
you've seen it on the TV. And they had what
was called a magnifying transmitter, which meant that the electricity
coming out of it was stronger than the electricity going
in test during one of these experiments, was struck by
an errant a bolt of electricity, and even though he
(06:38):
was grounded, he said that when he was struck by
this bolt, he had an experience where it felt like
that he had been catapulted outside of time and space.
Now this isn't his own words, and this was long
before you know, science had even started to try to
(07:02):
conceptualize what time was. But Tesla felt like that he
could see both the past, the present, and the future
all at the same time, and that for a brief
instant he had a perfect understanding on the way that
the universe was working. And unfortunately for us, his assistant,
(07:24):
who was with him and was on the ball, was
able to use the two by four to knock him
out of this electrical arc. Else, you know, he eventually
would have fried. But after this experience, and he said
that once he was out of it, then all of this,
all of this perception that he was that he was receiving,
just vanished, and it left him with the knowledge that
(07:50):
there was more going on with the universe than he
could that he could even you know, conceptualize in the
normal physical world. And because of that, he developed a
lifelong interest in trying to develop his own unified field theory.
Much like Einstein was working on and around you know,
this the same time, and all of that was based
(08:13):
on Tesla's accident and his idea that time was non existent,
that the past, the present, and future all exists at
the same time. It's it's it's difficult for our three
dimensional brains to understand that. But Tesla was probably one
(08:34):
of the first outside of you know, Eastern philosophers to
develop this idea that that time and space, first of all,
are one. That was something that Einstein then later brought
into brought into a theory.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
But that.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
Our perceptions of time moving forward is an illusion. Why
it's an illusion no one has really been able to
work out yet, Probably because we evolved in the three
dimensional world and you know, in the material plane and
anything beyond that we would not be able to survive.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
You know.
Speaker 3 (09:18):
We we evolved to avoid that sabertoothed tiger hiding in
the bushes. You know, if if you did not have
this constantly moving arrow moving forward in time as a species,
we would have died a long time ago. So that's
one of the mysteries of time that that Tesla started
(09:41):
to contemplate. It's so long ago and we're still trying
to work it out.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
What are some of your favorite stories that revolve around
time issues.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
Oh gosh, there's so many. You know, it's it's these,
you know, these personal anecdotes that people have come to
me over the years. You know. This Weird Time Exploring
the Mysteries of Time and Space is actually the third
book that I have written about time. It is constantly
(10:15):
a fascinating subject, and every time I put out one book,
I start getting letters from people telling me their own
personal experiences. And George, I had one of myself when
I was a kid that I haven't talked about a lot,
but it evolved a time slip when I was about
(10:38):
sixteen years old, and I have to admit this is
one of my own favorite stories because I know it happened.
You cannot you cannot tear me away with the idea
that something weird hadn't happened. And with a friend, we
had a flat tire while out of the country. This
(11:00):
was this was my dad's old station wagon, and so
we were trying to use, you know, like one of
those old fashioned attire jacks, and it wouldn't We were
parked on the shoulder and it wouldn't grab because of
the gravel, you know, it kept slipping, and we had
we had parked in front of an old farmhouse, and
(11:22):
from this farmhouse came this guy who brought us a
piece of flop plywood that we were then able to
jam under the jack to uh to give it a
base and change the tire and be on our way.
Well later my mom found out this story. Tried not
to tell them what had happened, but she found out
(11:44):
anyway and insisted that I bring this guy, I can't
remember that it was a pie or a cake something
like that, to thank him for helping us. I could
not then find this house. I knew exactly where it was,
was very familiar with the highway, the you know, the
country highway we were on. The house was gone. The
(12:07):
closest I could find to it was that I remember
that when we were originally stuck in front of it,
that it had old fashioned teacup rose bushes on either
side of the sidewalk that led from their front door
to the highway. I found a place that had these
(12:27):
teacup roses, now wild, but there was no house.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Did somebody and cart it away?
Speaker 3 (12:37):
It? It seems like it. And this was just in
less than a week's time. Maybe, but I could not
find this house. Maybe ye never there. I don't know
was it? Was it a ghostly experience? Was it a
time slip? I don't know it it it? You know
(12:57):
this happened when I was sixteen. I'm sixty seven now,
and this will always stay in my mind, wondering what
exactly happened that sunny afternoon.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
Explain what a time slip is.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
Then, A time slip is an experience that most of
the time it's an individual, but like in my case,
you know, I had a friend with me. It's where
it seems like that you have exited present time and
have entered another time. As simple as that, either a
(13:34):
past event or some people reported future events. The things
around you are seen to change. If, say, like you're
walking down a sidewalk, that sidewalk will change from concrete
to bricks. You'll start Instead of cars on the road,
(13:56):
there'll be horse drawn carriages. Skyscrapers will disappear, replaced by
brick buildings no more than just a couple of stories high.
You'll have all the sensory experiences. You can smell and
feel what's going on around you, and it appears like
(14:19):
that you have actually entered a past, our, future time.
It's often overwhelming to the people who have these experiences,
and then just as quickly it ends. It's it's like
almost like a reversed ghostly experience where instead of seeing
an individual phantasm, all of reality around you changes. And
(14:46):
it's a mysterious event that a lot of scientists don't
want to talk about, but it does make you wonder
whether or not that, as Einstein said, that time actually
has like currents and ebbs and flows around it that
(15:07):
can take you onto little sidetracks, maybe briefly into the past,
maybe briefly into the future.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at
one a m Eastern and go to Coast to coastam
dot com for more
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