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We experience Time in more than one way. Linear time moves forward, like an arrow flying, irreversibly: In linear time nothing is ever the same as it was. In cyclical time events repeat themselves in periods or cycles, moving with the slowness of tidal waves or with the high frequencies that determine the colours of light. One of the sources of popular music, that has a tendency to repeat itself, is the human penchant for rocking, swaying and moving in circles.
Time is change against a cyclical background: when nothing changes and the usual cycles repeat themselves we say that time is standing still. Time is the sovereign measure to which living nature stirs. Many facets of life are modulated by the passage of time: the clocks of crabs are set by the periodicity of the tide, virus and bacteria have their incubation time, trees produce bloom and fruits in a seasonal sequence, there is a meaningful message in the light pulses of fire-flies, the sounds in voice and speech utterances, the harmonic relations in music.
Straight time and cyclic time are important in communication. We will call the information exchange with and within the human organism external and internal communication. Internal communication plays a vital role in the healthy functioning of organs. It is taken for granted until the stomach is upset or the heart skips a beat. Efficient movement, as in athletics, in individual and team sports is obtained by coordinating internal functions and external behaviour.
Cyclic time is characteristic for many coded messages. These messages, also called stimuli, sometimes interact with singular events in straight time: time-slots that offer an exclusive opportunity, e.g. a phase of fecundity, or the sensitive period in which a child can acquire the use of language, or the phase during the day or night that a medical drug has an optimal effect.
To understand the role of temporal-dynamic qualities in internal and external communication, we will become familiar with time and time-scales. Like music, nature performs in various measures: presto for humming birds, andante for humans, largo for turtles.
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