Now I am no
Einstein. Lord knows I can’t explain the
theory of relativity, let alone give the mathematical proof for the relativity
of time. Yet, today, I will prove that
time is indeed relative, but with a caveat.
My proof is outside of Einstein’s world of physics, and into the world
of human experience.
We
experience two worlds. One is the world
of what is -- the material world where physics and mathematics reside. The other is the world of action -- what we
do and how we choose to behave in the material world. This is the world where values reside. Values animate and give impetus to our actions,
and underlie the choices we make. Unlike
the material world, there are no mathematical formulations to predict human
behavior. Human behavior is not
mechanical or logical. There is always
an emotional component (values) that sway our choices. We do
not look to science and mathematics for our values. Values are formulated and transmitted through
language, stories, and myths.
It is in the
action world, the world of values, where the perception of time gets
interesting. There is a fascinating
study by a behavioral economist, Keith Chen, on the influence of language in financial
planning.
Unlike
English, there are languages, such as Mandarin Chinese, which lack verb tenses
to distinguish between the present and the future. In Chinese it is not the verb but the context
of the conversation, among other markers, which distinguishes time periods
.
Chen
wondered if this linguistic difference influences people’s time perception
sufficiently to influence retirement savings.
He hypothesized that people speaking languages that have no verbal
distinction between the present and the future will experience the future as closer
to the present, thereby creating impetus to save for the future. On the flip side, languages which verbally
distinguish between the present and the future make the future harder to relate
to, and, hence, plan for.
That is exactly what Chen found when he compared the savings rate
between people who spoke languages with or without a future tense. People who speak languages with a separate
future tense -- English, Arabic, Greek, the Romance languages – are far worse
at saving money than people whose languages don’t distinguish between the
present and the future – Chinese, German, Japanese, and Norwegian.
After factoring in people’s education levels, income levels, and religious
preferences, Chen found that people speaking languages with present and future
verbs were 30 percent less likely to save money in any given year.
As crazy as this sounds, Chen replicated this
finding in a clever real world experiment.
New hires at a company were required to fill out a form which included providing
the percentage of their salary they would devote to a retirement plan. One form had their current picture affixed to
the top corner of the form, while another had the current picture affixed to
one corner and a computer aged photo of themselves affixed to the opposite
corner. Yup, having a current and older
picture to view increased the percentage of retirement savings significantly.
All of this discussion is prelude to the meat of
what I want to discuss – how the underpinnings of secular and religious views influence
time perception, world views, and policy prescriptions.
Until next time
