History Main / TimeDissonance

Compare YearInsideHourOutside and contrast its inverse, YearOutsideHourInside, compare and contrast NarniaTime, and see MerlinSickness for another difference in the way time is experienced, and RobotsThinkFaster. Compare ProportionalAging, where the dissonance affects a creature's rate of maturation. For beings who experience/see their present, future and past all at once, see NonLinearCharacter. See also [[SciFiWritersHave/NoSenseOfTime Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Time]].

Compare YearInsideHourOutside and contrast its inverse, YearOutsideHourInside, compare and contrast NarniaTime, and see MerlinSickness for another difference in the way time is experienced. Compare ProportionalAging, where the dissonance affects a creature's rate of maturation. For beings who experience/see their present, future and past all at once, see NonLinearCharacter. See also [[SciFiWritersHave/NoSenseOfTime Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Time]].

* In ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'', some of {{Ma|dScientist}}yuri's excessively powerful reflex-boosting SuperSerum gets accidentally ingested by Szayel. As a result, Szayel's perception of time becomes so extremely fast that everything seems virtually frozen in place, [[AndIMustScream including his own body]]. He is killed less than a minute later, but to him it felt like years.

Time flows differently for people depending on their age, mood, and perspective. Never is this more pronounced than with vampires, robots, aliens and the like who are {{immortal|ity}} and have been around a [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld long]], ''[[TimeAbyss long]]'' time. These [[WhatMeasureIsANonHuman beings]] tend to view years, decades, centuries and millennia like we view days, hours or even seconds. What's more, they will [[strike:boast]] [[CantArgueWithElves "argue"]] that they and/or their entire race "Do not conceive of time as humans do", and see no urgency to a situation; they'll compare humans to [[WeAreAsMayflies mayflies]] and liken our "frantic lives" to the desperate struggling of the doomed.

Often this is blatantly untrue, as they're either flighty ADHD elves/[[TheHedonist hedonists]] who can't see past the moment, or in the worst HiddenElfVillage tradition have underestimated the power of the fiend raising TheLegionsOfHell. The explanation is usually that their limitless lives have completely devalued time of all worth, so they'll spend their days in an opium haze.

If they truly ''do'' conceive of time differently, expect deep [[{{koan}} philosophical sentiments]] and quite a bit of sadness or detachment, and if not superior and condescending, they'll often marvel at how humans [[HumansAreFlawed rush around and accomplish so much]] in their [[PunyEarthlings puny lifespans]]. Other times, beings who are literally outside of time will experience time non-linearly, seeing effect precede cause and move laterally to create parallel timelines.

* Creator/VernorVinge's ''Literature/AFireUponTheDeep'' has an inversion: {{Sufficiently Advanced Alien}}s ("Powers") view time quite differently from normal species. That is, much, much faster.
** The galaxy is divided into inconceivably enormous "zones of thought" which change both the intelligence of living creatures and the laws of physics which set the boundaries for artificial technology. The core of the Milky Way is buried inside The Unthinking Depths (where a human being becomes almost nonsentient), ancient humanity's home of Earth is implied to lie within The Slow Zone (where, among other things, superluminality is impossible), and the "place to be" is The Beyond (which allows [[FasterThanLightTravel FTL]] technology and other wondrous things). Where things get really strange though, is The Transcend, which the outermost reaches of the galaxy dip into. Merely doing a tiny bit of scientific research while venturing over there allows you to AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence almost at once, but the Powers thus created gain the ability to think and create at an enormous speed, causing civilizations to rise and seemingly vanish from contact there in decades or years, and so The Trancend is an extremely tumultuous place (which is made somewhat more intimidating yet for prospective explorers by the [[StarfishAliens abandoned remnants of certain vanished Powers]] and [[NeglectfulPrecursors the apathetic attitude of existing Powers]].) The oldest known Power, referred to by all as Old One, is eleven years old.
** The reader is given a first-hand account of this when the Straumli Perversion, a [[SealedEvilInACan Sealed]] EldritchAbomination [[SealedEvilInACan in a Can]], first gains sentience. As it develops, its sense of time dilates exponentially, until each second that passes seems to last longer than its ''entire existence up to that point'':
--->Days passed. For the evil that was growing in the new machines, each hour was longer than all the time before. Now the newborn was less than an hour from its great flowering.... The hours came to minutes, the minutes to seconds. And now each second was as long as all the time before.... Five seconds, ten seconds, more change than ten thousand years of a human civilization.

* The aliens of ''{{Film/Arrival}}'' perceive time differently from humans, and it's actually a part of their language. [[spoiler: They can actually see their own futures as well.]] This turns into a big twist when it's revealed [[spoiler: what we thought were flashbacks of Louise's dead daughter Hannah are actually visions of her from the future]].

[[folder:Film]]

* In ''Series/{{Dune}}'', the Bene Gesserit have their Simulflow technique where they voluntarily alter their perception of time to their desires. Then there is the nearly immortal God Emperor Leto II. He comments how his once a decade procession was just yesterday, or how he'll think a thought for an entire day because what is time to him.
* In ''Series/TheOuterLimits1995'' episode "Vanishing Act", the aliens abducting Jon Cryer's character transport him another decade into Earth's future every time they return him, because as it turns out, they have no concept of time. Once the concept is explained to them, it's no problem for them to return him to the right time.

* In ''Legion of Super-Heroes'', Element Lad ends up in a TimeAbyss after an incident involved him being sent to the beginning of the universe and living in isolation before life evolved where he was. By the time his friends meet him again, he's on such a different time scale that he's completely forgetful of conversations that occurred moments before, and has taken to calling other life blinkers in reference to their lifespans.
* Marvel's Comicbook/{{Quicksilver}} experiences this. As he tells Doc Samson, what kind of attitude do you think ''you'd'' cop if everyone else seemed like that one guy who's really slow in the supermarket checkout line?
* Averted in ''Comicbook/TheSandman'', as Dream is about to punish his captor's son: "Time moves no faster for us than it does for you." In other words, he felt ''every day'' of the seventy-five years he was imprisoned, which makes [[FateWorseThanDeath what he does to his victim]], someone who could have released him ''decades'' earlier, a little more understandable.

* Referenced on occasion in ''Literature/{{The Bartimaeus Trilogy}}''

* Played with somewhat in ''Literature/TheBelgariad''

* Shows up in ''Literature/TheDresdenFiles'' - the older (and hence more experienced and magically powerful) wizards were all born a few centuries ago, and haven't adapted to rapidly changing technology. Of course the fact that any technology that was made post-WW2 is basically guaranteed to fall apart in their presence makes it pretty tough. Generally their inability to get with the times is a bad thing, particularly because many Supernatural monsters are much more up to date

* ''Literature/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'': Parodied in ''Literature/LifeTheUniverseAndEverything'', where what sends Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged [[WhoWantsToLiveForever off the deep end]] is [[CoolAndUnusualPunishment the prospect of infinite, mind-crushingly boring, slow-moving Sunday afternoons]]. Ditto with [[spoiler:Thor]] in the Dirk Gently novel ''Literature/TheLongDarkTeaTimeOfTheSoul''.
* In ''Literature/IHaveNoMouthAndIMustScream'', AM alters Ted's sense of time [[spoiler:after he [[MercyKill frees]] Benny, Ellen, Gorrister and Nimdok.]]

* "The Ballad of Barry Allen" by Jim's Big Ego is sung from the point of view of Franchise/TheFlash, lamenting the fact that because he's so fast, his sense of time is ruined because he can do so much more than anyone else in the same amount of time.

--> '''Jesus:''' Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day; he saw it and was glad.
--> '''Pharisees:''' You are not yet fifty years old, [[SarcasmMode and you have seen Abraham?!]]
--> '''Jesus:''' [[CatchPhrase I tell you the truth]], before Abraham was born, '''I am!'''

* [[PlayingWithATrope Played with]] quite a bit in ''Toys/{{Bionicle}}''.
** Most of the main characters are at least [[TimeAbyss a few dozen millenia old]], but their personalities can be quite different from one another even if they're the same age. Anyone in the main setting considered to be truly old ''was around at the beginning of the world''. Even if you count someone's age starting from the earliest time they can remember, that's still a millennium for all the Matoran of Mata Nui. Even [[BigBad Makuta]]'s plot had gone on for several thousand years before he brought it to fruition. Still, the main story takes place [[ComicBookTime just over a year]], which isn't commented on by anyone despite their huge lifespans.
** In the Spherus/Bara Magna setting this is downplayed somewhat, as there are mentions of those who have actually died of old age. Still, that means that 'young' characters such as Gresh have still been around for ''upwards of 100,000 years''.

* ''VideoGame/{{Homeworld}}''

* ''Webcomic/GunnerkriggCourt''

* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/AladdinTheSeries'' had Genie say that a genie cold lasts for only a century or two, and realizes he forget that's a long time for mortals.
** Another episode has him falling in love with Eden, a fellow genie. Since Eden watches over a young girl and Genie has his own obligations to help Aladdin and friends they casually make plans for a date next century instead (when both parties will be long dead) like they're talking about next week. Though they do end up running into each other again in a later episode before then.

* Clockwork of ''WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom'' does not view time in the linear way most beings do.