An approachable, accessible history of timekeeping and the impact of
the increasing precision and accuracy of time on humanity.
Western culture has been obsessed with regulating society by the
precise, accurate measurement of time since the Middle Ages. In On
Time, Ken Mondschein explores the paired development of concepts and
technologies of timekeeping with human thought. Without clocks, he
argues, the modern world as we know it would not exist. From the
astronomical timekeeping of the ancient world to the tower clocks of the
Middle Ages to the seagoing chronometer, the quartz watch, and the
atomic clock, greater precision and accuracy have had profound effects
on human society--which, in turn, has driven the quest for further
precision and accuracy. This quest toward automation--which gave rise to
the Gregorian calendar, the factory clock, and even the near-disastrous
Y2K bug--has led to profound social repercussions and driven the
creation of the modern scientific mindset.
Surveying the evolution of the clock from prehistory to the twenty-first
century, Mondschein explains how both the technology and the philosophy
behind Western timekeeping regimes came to take over the entire world.
On Time is a story of thinkers, philosophers, and scientists, and of
the thousand decisions that continue to shape our daily lives.
