Circadian (1): When the Windows Are Covered

Let me take you on a tour today. We are entering a tall building that houses a production company—a massive operation with a full staff of resident workers. Inside, there are offices, storage rooms, supplies, management suites, education facilities, sales outlets, parking lots, waste disposal areas, security posts, staff accommodation, and a canteen. There is even a vented air conditioning system. Every department works in tandem to keep the company running smoothly. The company has operated for decades; despite various ups and downs, it has always managed to survive.

As we tour the building, observing each department in action, something unexpected happens. The windows suddenly go dark, as if a massive blackout curtain has been draped over the building. The clocks stop ticking, and the digital time displays on computers and phones vanish. Lights are turned on so the company can continue to function, but the sun is nowhere to be seen. There is no longer any way to tell when night will fall or when the day will rise.

There are no supply issues, no staffing problems, and the cash flow initially remains unchanged. The only thing missing is the ability to tell time.

Chaos ensues. Security is no longer sure when to do their rounds. A supply backlog builds up because production is unaware that the next cycle is due. Waste disposal appointments are missed. Sales teams fail to meet their deadlines. The canteen prepares food while the workers are busy, then puts it away just as they become hungry. Staff cycle in and out of their dormitories, assuming their fatigue must mean it is nighttime. Workers are present in some departments but absent in others; the normally occupied desks now have random vacancies. The air conditioning works sporadically, leaving the building sweltering or freezing at the most uncomfortable moments.

Fortunately, the company has a skilled manager holding everything together. Despite the lack of a clock, the manager issues occasional instructions to keep things moving. However, the company cannot perform as it once did. It is merely getting by.

The tour we just took is a tour of our own bodies. I argue that most modern humans have lost their internal contact with time. We don’t recognise this because we think we know the time. We believe we are in sync because we look at our watches. We fail to realise that the time on a clock means virtually nothing to our organs. What we register mentally does not change the darkness of the "windows" through which our organs view time.

Just like the workers in that building, our organs need to be able to tell the time individually to perform their tasks. Currently, we are over-dependent on the "manager" (the brain’s intellectual understanding of time) for our collective wellbeing. Like that struggling company, our health will continue to decline.

Notice that in our story, there was no problem with supplies or staffing. Your diet may not have changed, and you are still young. Yet, something doesn’t feel right: the fatigue, the unrefreshing sleep, the failing internal thermostat, the stubborn weight, the brain fog, the mood swings, the uninvited toilet visits, and the short temper—all despite doing everything "right." You try diet and exercise, changing the company’s supplies and production lines, which help slightly. But is everything right on the inside? If you feel like something is going to give one day, that feeling may be communicating the biological truth you are living in.

In fact, many people don’t realise they are facing this issue because the brain maintains a superficial contact with time. In addition to reading clocks, the brain translates blue light into a "daytime" message via the suprachiasmatic nucleus. This is where light signals travel after reaching the eyes, affecting gene transcriptors known as BMAL and CLOCK1. The brain uses this to decide what to do and when.

Because we think of time intellectually rather than feeling it biologically, we don't notice our dissociation until the brain itself begins to struggle. The brain tries to tell the rest of the body what to do, but it has bitten off more than it can chew; managing every organ's schedule was never its original task. For the "company" to perform, our bodies need independence and autonomy at the level of individual departments—our organs.

To make matters worse, the brain’s understanding of time is often hijacked by counterfeits. Imagine the manager in the darkened building is the only one who can see a clock, but he is being fed the wrong time. This is what happens when a person with a time-confused body holds up a phone in bed and starts scrolling. The brain thinks, "It's daytime! I'd better let the rest of the body know!"