By David Ponce
There are those who believe that time is nothing but a human construct, an imaginary notion that only exists because we do. It’s a little metaphysical and we don’t know enough about the topic to weigh in either way, but we can attest to the fact that time definitely feels a lot more variable than it is. When you’re having fun, it just flies by, whereas second feels like an hour when you’re bored. The TicTocTrac watch is a project from a couple of students from Cornell University that not only tells time like a regular timepiece, it also lets you measure your own perception of its passing. The way this is done is by first activating the watch through a double tap gesture, at which point it will briefly flash a random number between 5 and 55. This is the amount of minutes you’re supposed to estimate, and you have to double tap the watch again when you think this amount has elapsed. The device will then tell you if you’re over or underestimated and by how much. You can also save this number to an SD card, allowing you to plot your performance over time.
The practical use of all this? None really, but it is interesting nonetheless. Not enough to make it a commercially available product though, so if you want in on the action, you’re going to have to build it yourself with the instructions found at the link below.
[ TicTocTract Watch Assembly Instructions ] VIA [ TheVerge ]
