Interesting dimensional analysis question posed about time perception

Join the discussion
Ask a follow-up here, or get your own question answered by working scientists, mathematicians and engineers — people, not an autocomplete.
Real named experts · corrections over time · the nuance an AI answer skips
1 reply · 2K views
cogandil
Messages
1
Reaction score
0

Homework Statement


If you could hypothetically experience 1 femtosecond (1E-15 s) the same way you do normally for 1 second, how long would it seem to experience 7.078E-4 seconds?


Homework Equations


note: 1 femtosecond is to 1 second, what 1 second is to 31.7 million years.


The Attempt at a Solution


I just thought of this question, but I haven't actually been able to solve it.
 
Physics news on Phys.org
So basically, your question is asking "If 1 femtosecond feels like 1 second, how long does [tex]7.078\times 10^{-4}[/tex] seconds feel like?"

There's no immediately evident way to relate this to relativity, since time is the only quantity involved, and assuming your brain didn't change, your ability to measure time in any other reference frame can only decrease because of time dilation, not increase.

Thus, the obvious linear relationship is the only answer that seems logical to me:

[tex]\frac{10^{-15}\ s}{1\ s} = \frac{7.078\times 10^{-4}\ s}{t}[/tex]

[tex]t = 7.078\times 10^{11}\ s = 22429\ years[/tex]

...which is not a timescale the human brain is evolved to comprehend either!