Response Essay to “Time and Machine”

Aldous Leonard Huxley was an English writer and philosopher. He wrote nearly fifty books—both
novels and non-fiction works—as well as wide-ranging essays, narratives, and poems. The authors of this
response essay will analyze one of the many essays Huxley wrote; “Time and Machine”.
Huxley had the intentions of writing an essay that looks into the psychological and social effects of an
increasingly industrialized society. His essay, at that time, looks into the distant future, and adds in the subject
of time to compare and contrast an industrialized society and the pre-industrialism world’s time awareness.
He says that Time is our tyrant of a lord, who rules pretty much of our daily lives. Huxley’s observation remains
true until today, where our consciousness of time is acute, and remarks that the only men who still remember
the ‘art of waiting’ are those of the East or the Orient. But, this is the Modern Age now, these countries' economic
progress are catching up to the West, and these Eastern countries will inevitably face the same psycho-social
crisis that Huxley observes in the United States and the United Kingdoms in his time.
Huxley observes a paradox: namely the extreme knowledge of brief periods of time but almost a blind
ignorance of broader time-scales such as the length of a day, the change of seasons; in short, the natural passing
of time. Huxley relates this to the urban expansion of the world, which has made it impossible for the everyday
man to even see the heavens and the nature of reality around them with its 'artificial universe' of skyscrapers
and concrete jungles, much less to actually calculate time. Huxley seems to lament the age of industrialization
and the age of 'hand-work' with mourning.
Time, as Huxley said, is a recent invention of Man. But what does time have to do with a mortal’s life,
for instance, how did it affect the ancestors of the past and today’s post-industrialism humans? Huxley’s essay
explains to us both our ancestors’ time awareness (cosmic time) and the effect of Industrialism on the time
awareness of working men and women.
The essay flashes the changes produced by the recently created time convention. The changes
however are equally beneficial and risky, making the choosing of sides a significant matter of
perspective. Different minds comprehend different ideas, people would inevitably choose one side over the
other, again it all proves to be a matter of perspective.
Before diving further into the analysis of the essay, it is important to note that time is not displayed as
a scientific fact, rather it is shown to the reader as a consciousness that is impacted by how humans perceive it.
This different conception may start off as biased, opinionated, broad, and factually comes off as incorrect to the
reader as he starts reading the essay. But as the essay progresses and discusses the distinct characteristics of
the two perceptions of time, Huxley manages to persuade the reader to view time and the world that revolves
around it through his own lens that Huxley himself procured to prove his own point. His own point being the
superiority of cosmic time, though the multiple issues of this point will later be discussed by the authors of this
response essay.
The reason that his conclusion of the superiority of cosmic time is strongly questioned by the authors
of this response essay is the numerous issues contained in his essay. But first, let us differentiate the two
different consciousnesses of time. Time is divided into two major concepts: cosmic time and post-industrialism
time. The Pre-Industrialism Era focuses on man’s connection with nature as it is also man’s link with time.

Lozano E. M. || Alonte J. P. || Odal A. J. || Tiongco W. || Salvador B. C.

Nature was then considered as man’s only link with time since there were no machines that could be used to
determine the hour or month in the year. Of course, nature did not identify time in months or hours, but as
seasons and from constellations, only an estimated time. The Industrialism Era and the time period after are
driven by the constant ticking of the clock, the modern man never ceasing to pause in his own busy life. In this
era, with the invention of machines, the link with nature is no longer needed. In this era, time is divided into
smaller acute measures: seconds, minutes, hours. Man has a precise awareness of time in its smallest fractions
and has machines that can accurately identify the time down to the smallest unit. Huxley strongly differentiated
these two eras, showing the reader two different perceptions of time which were both weighed by their
advantages and disadvantages.
In his essay, Huxley highlights properly and unbiasedly the psychological drawbacks of the new time
consciousness. The problems he stated were problems that are present in many people today, specifically the
distress that everyone suffers from being tortured in anxiety. The first problem to be discussed is the stress
that people feel from the constant news to organize time into fixed blocks. As Huxley mentioned, machines now
set the pace for the workers, and for them to cope with this new pace they must learn to create schedules to
manage their time effectively. But this method of time management is not an easy task and a majority of
working men and women find it stressful and drives the general masses mad. Daly (2014) mentioned that when
one is late for work, they create an immediate loss of productivity. Something as simple as this destroying a
large system in a working man or woman’s life clearly illustrates how humans have adopted time into their
daily lives. Huxley also emphasized the stress created by managing workloads. This can also refer to how
humans have learned to value their time, the short minutes within the long hours stretched infinitely to cater
to the things that the human must do. This idea of the importance within the minutes of time dates back to
1,500 BCE, where sundials were the first machines that divided the day into parts (Rogers, 2011). As Huxley
expressed in his essay, records are to be and must be broken within fractions of a day: in hours, minutes, or
even seconds. With the workload modern men have, a large majority do not have the luxury of relaxing at any
time since doing so could destroy the whole order of a working man’s day.
Furthermore, there is also distress from thinking that every time block must have its own meaning.
That is to say that time, in its own nature, must be used to its best accord. Huxley emphasized that there are
‘trains to be caught, clocks to be punched and tasks to be done in specified periods’. Longo (2018) phrased it as
having too many tabs on your web browser, slowing the whole system down. This anxiety created from always
questioning themselves if there is something else needed to be done in a specific time gives people a sense of
paranoia, a deep fear of lost time, something all humans know is irredeemable. This new awareness does give
a lot of stress, however, this stress is also a product of industrialism itself and should not be blamed wholly on
the new concept of time.
The positives and negatives of Industrialism are complex (History, 2009); it still has an enormous
impact on our society as we know it today. To be clear, Industrialism means that machines are used to replace
so-called manual labor (Benefits Of, 2015). The coming of the new consciousness had made positive and
negative changes to man, but Huxley emphasized more on the negatives and had antagonized Industrialism.

Lozano E. M. || Alonte J. P. || Odal A. J. || Tiongco W. || Salvador B. C.

Even if progress is vital for us humans, the essay puts the pre-industrial man on a higher level compared to the
industrial man, since time was not a bothering problem for them. The authors of this reaction paper strongly
reacted to this odd proposition wherein development was put in bad light since the authors of this paper
themselves still feel the extraordinary lasting aftershocks of the Industrial revolution. Unfortunately for the
industrial man, with schedules and routines, time has become of equal value and importance as money. One
could even go as far as to say that time is more important than money. The mindset of “I have got to do it today!”
and “I will have no time to do these by tomorrow!” is as toxic as Chernobyl, and with the Butterfly Effect, it may
cause grave consequences which could cause humanity to slowly destroy itself. Industrialism had more
corruption than pre-industrialism, the authors of the paper themselves have observed that the rich and
privileged had plenty of time to kill and where the poor had a scarcity of it. Albeit the awareness of time made
man more efficient in work and progress, it has resulted in being less efficient in self-care and time
management. Progress is a double-edged sword, just by the discovery of steam power and the awareness of
time has made man more efficient than ever but at the same time, produced a society of anxiety, a society where
man is often forced to prioritize work over time spent with his family. This section shows readers that the new
consciousness was groundbreaking, bringing up new changes with pros and cons that are rather questionable.
Factories, offices, skyscrapers, restaurants, and a bunch of other buildings are what replaced nature’s
touch on the land, driving away some of the local fauna, now littered with humans walking through and from
their homes to their jobs. Huxley exaggerated some parts of the situation, but it is true that Industrialism had a
great effect on our world, still felt today. Huxley assumes and generalizes Man that they have completely lost
touch with nature. In other parts of the world, for example, a man of the Orient still shows a connection to
nature, he who still remembers the natural movement of the universe and knows the art of waiting (with even
a hint of satisfaction). Huxley might have viewed the advancement of technology as a threat to society as a
whole, changing everything that we know to something newer and “better”. The authors of this response essay
strongly disagree with this part in Huxley’s essay. It is true that machines have replaced the role of nature in
society, but as stated above it is a generalization of the human race. True, humans do not need to look to the
stars to determine the day, humans do not need to see if a tree’s leaves are falling to tell it is autumn, but these
feelings still contribute to the entire concept of the present time. Humans are still connected to the natural
world, only this time, they are aided by gadgets that provide them with accuracy and sureness that they did not
have before. Yet it is certain that since the coming of the machine-governed age, man has lost touch with nature
and instead has a newfound connection to the machines.
Moving forward, the essay gives no positive future on the path of industrialism. To start with the
optimistic effect of Industrialism, it was revolutionary in a good way as it opened so many new ways for life in
contrast to the times before it, where more than 90% of people lived in farms and in the villages with tools
powered by animals, water or wind (Kids Discover, n.d.). This pragmatic effect still lasts today as Industrialism
continues to produce progress, stability, and technology. This gave people a new variety of entertainment to
enjoy as well as advancements in all fields of science. People have increased their lifespan and gave themselves
more time to enjoy themselves. This may not be possible without the new awareness that opened a way for

Lozano E. M. || Alonte J. P. || Odal A. J. || Tiongco W. || Salvador B. C.

people to manage themselves in order to keep on improving. Because of this, the readers could conclude that
the essay focuses on the adversities that humans receive in exchange for the new consciousness. It is true that
stress and anxiety were drawbacks of this new consciousness, but are they really the only things that should
matter? It overlooks the fact that the new concept of time speeds up the development of society. It has given
the human race a sense of urgency, the bitter truth that their time on Earth is a mere dot in the course of cosmic
time; thus giving birth to humans’ present time consciousness. Because of this sense of urgency, humans have
adapted their lifestyles to working efficiently leading to better results at work that may benefit society; this
being wholly overlooked in the essay. The entire concept of ‘losing time’ has led the human race to value time.
The authors of this response essay strongly believe that the argument regarding the better type of
time-consciousness has no endpoint. One idealist metaphysician, J. M. E. MacTaggart (1908) argued that time
is actually unreal because humans’ descriptions of it are necessarily either contradictory, circular, or
insufficient; the point in this statement with regards to this essay not the unreality of time, but rather the
pointless debate that society tends to have regarding this topic of multiple interpretations. To move forward,
society must understand that time is constantly passing by each individual, that humans are constantly losing
it if they choose to keep the past state of mind. But to value the beauty in the simplicity of the Pre-Industrial
era is not wrong either, as choosing to value such a thing is a simple matter of preference. The authors of this
response essay feel that the minor details used by Huxley to illustrate his point were fine and concise, but those
he chose to overlook were straight up annoying to miss in his essay, as these other details were seemingly the
only ones that contradicted his concept.
Nevertheless, Huxley managed to stir the authors’ minds, making them question the time they once
thought they knew. His essay was truly astounding, interesting, and thought-provoking. The concept of time
was an interesting topic to read about. Though the selection did have a few points that aren’t exactly agreeable,
it also interests those who agree and the essay gives them a pleasing review. One could realize the perspective
of the author, making them aware of the things that they are ignorant about such as the intensity and
seriousness of stress and anxiety due to time awareness. A failure in waking up due to alarm clock tolerance is
bound to ruin the whole day of a person. A simple mishap in reading the time or being tardy even for a few
minutes, would create multiple consequences afterwards. The anxiety of losing and wasting time is enough to
make one’s life harder than it was. For people with a perspective against the authors’, they could raise questions
about the benefits of time awareness and industrialism or risks of staying in cosmic time reference. The idea of
the Time and the Machine is without a doubt something that has carved today’s present conception of time.
Profoundly, the Time and the Machine are an interesting combination; one of true chemistry and grave
importance in today’s modern world.

Lozano E. M. || Alonte J. P. || Odal A. J. || Tiongco W. || Salvador B. C.

References:
Benefits of industrialization. (2015, November 10.). Z. Erwin. Retrieved December 18, 2020, from
http://benefitof.net/benefits-of-industrialization/

History.com Editors. (2009, October 29). Industrial Revolution. Retrieved December 18, 2020, from
https://www.history.com/topics/industrial-revolution/industrial-revolution

Noozhawk. (n.d). John Daly: The Consequences of Being Late. Retrieved December 18, 2020, from
https://www.noozhawk.com/article/john_daly_the_consequences_of_being_late_20140722

Modern Philosophy. (n.d.). Retrieved December 18, 2020, from http://www.exactlywhatistime.com/philosophy-of-

A Brief History of Time Measurement. (n.d.). Retrieved December 18, 2020, from https://nrich.maths.org/6070

McTaggart, J. E. (1908). The Unreality of Time (Vol. 17, No. 68). Oxford University Press. Retrieved December 18, 2020, from
https://librivox.org/unreality_of_time/. hmm, basin ganahan niya kag True Beauty h

Longo, A. (2018, April 6). The Negative Effects of Cramming : A No-Brainer. retrieved December 15, 2020, from
https://brainhackers.com/the-negative-effects-of-cramming-a-no-brainer/

Lozano E. M. || Alonte J. P. || Odal A. J. || Tiongco W. || Salvador B. C.