Kyle VanHemert talks about a new tool for keeping time:
Durr [seen above] is a watch designed to draw attention to that slippery disconnect between time as it passes and how we perceive it passing. Instead of hands or numbers, it’s just a solid, colorful disk. Every five minutes, it vibrates. … [Designer Theo] Tveterås says it adds an undeniable “rhythm” to the day, chopping it into chunks small enough to let you look back and consider what you’ve been doing (vibrating any more often than every five minutes, they found was annoying; any longer than 10 and it became hard to remember when the last interval started).
Of course, giving people an existential metronome can have the opposite effect. In some cases, it hasn’t led to the wearer noticing the passing of time but rather time passing away. “We’ve gotten feedback from other people using it that it acts a little like a countdown for life, which wasn’t the intention at all,” Tveterås says. “But the memento mori aspect is very fascinating, too.”
Tikker, another new watch, is designed to be a countdown of your life, second by second – based on “an algorithm like the one used by the federal government to figure a person’s life expectancy“:
Tikker’s inventor is a 37-year-old Swede named Fredrik Colting. He says he invented the gadget not as a morbid novelty item, but in an earnest attempt to change his own thinking. He wanted some sort of reminder to not sweat the small stuff and reach for what matters. Colting, a former gravedigger, figured imminent death was the best motivator there is. That’s why he calls Tikker “the happiness watch.” It’s his belief that watching your life slip away will remind you to savor life while you have it. And, it turns out, there is some evidence for his point of view. A 2009 study showed that thinking about death makes you savor life more. And a 2011 study has shown that thinking about death makes you more generous, more likely to donate your blood.
Jenny Davis doesn’t mind that the algorithm is flawed:
Really, the Tikker is not much different than putting an inspirational saying on your bathroom mirror. It reminds you to live a certain way, focuses your energies on this lifestyle mentality, and encourages you to remain reflexive, always mindful of who you are, who you want to be, and how you have to live to get there. … This technology quantifies the self inaccurately, but these inaccuracies are of little consequence, as the numbers are but tools in the pursuit of a particular kind of mindfulness; a particular urgency of life.
The Dish 