Running for president is the new selfie.

At its most fundamental, information is a binary choice. In other words, a single bit of information is one yes-or-no choice.

The microwave oven is one of the modern objects that convey the most elemental feeling of power over the passing seconds ... If you suffer from hurry sickness in its most advanced stages, you may find yourself punching 88 seconds instead of 90 because it is faster to tap the same digit twice.

When the Lilliputians first saw Gulliver's watch, that "wonderful kind of engine...a globe, half silver and half of some transparent metal," they identified it immediately as the god he worshiped. After all, "he seldom did anything without consulting it: he called it his oracle, and said it pointed out the time for every action in his life." To Jonathan Swift in 1726 that was worth a bit of satire. Modernity was under way. We're all Gullivers now. Or are we Yahoos?

Vengeful conquerors burn books as if the enemy's souls reside there, too.

Ideas that require people to reorganize their picture of the world provoke hostility.

We say that time passes, time goes by, and time flows. Those are metaphors. We also think of time as a medium in which we exist.