East of West, West of East:“Lives and Time(s) in Singapore

19th October 2016

Adrian W J Kuah

Senior Research Fellow

Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy

1

It’s about time

Save time

(Don’t) Waste time

Make time

Mark time

Kill time

Stop time

Turn back time

Take your time

In time

Just in time

On time

Down time

Time out

Out of time

Time’s up

Time off

Good times

Bad times

End times

Where got time?

Timed out?

2

Stargazing: Memoirs of a Young Lighthouse Keeper

By Peter Hill

“Try staying awake until three in the morning and you will soon find you are so tired you can hardly think…Then stare at the sky and contemplate the vastness of the universe. Gradually you will turn into a lighthouse keeper. But take your time, for time is precious. There’s no hurry. There never is on a lighthouse…” (p. 49)

3

4

From the “annihilation of space by time” (D Harvey, 1989)

to

the “annihilation of time by time”?

Is faster necessarily better?

5

Space of Flows? Space of Places? Both? For whom?

6

Time(s) of our lives

• Tempo (how fast a thing is)

• Periodicity (how often the thing happens)

• Timing (how the thing synchronises with other things)

• Duration (how long the thing lasts)

• Sequence (the order in which the thing occurs)

• Density (how many things are going on)

7

8

The Future Cannot Begin