Draw a diagram of how you imagine a year, week etc.

[The Monkey]

This is something that has been fascinating me for a long time. When someone says a date, like November 15, I place it on a diagram in my mind that takes the form of a circle. Same thing with the week. Most people have some form of mindmap for these sorts of things, how does your look like?

Here's mine for the year:

...and the week:

NOTE: These are very rough and many details have had to be omitted, but it sketch of how it looks.

EDIT: I also have a fairly complicated diagram of the time period from 0 AD until now, will maybe draw it later.

 

[CyberPitz]

Wut..?

 

[Darkside55]

Draw a diagram of a year, week, etc.

It's called a calendar.

 

[The Monkey]

You mean to say that you don't place dates on a diagram in your head?

 

[Yorick]

You mean to say that you don't place dates on a diagram in your head?

That is exactly what we mean to say.

 

[The Monkey]

D:

So how do you manage? What goes on in your head if I say March 27?

 

[Raziaar]

 

[Gemma]

Whut?

 

[The Monkey]

That's the thing to the left?

 

[Yorick]

D:

So how do you manage? What goes on in your head if I say March 27?

Nothing? What should March 27th signify?

 

[Raziaar]

It's my expected death date.

I imagine my life, the things you asked about... as a clock. And as we all know, a clock moves pretty rapidly.

 

[Vegeta897]

I mean I guess I imagine it like this.

 

[The Monkey]

Nothing? What should March 27th signify?

Well, nothing, it was just a random date. The thing is that I place every date on the above diagram in my head when I hear them, that's how I sort them out. I thought everyone had a similar process.

 

[MuToiD_MaN]

I imagine the months of the year as being on this linear calendar that continues ad infinitum.

 

[Ennui]

Well, nothing, it was just a random date. The thing is that I place every date on the above diagram in my head when I hear them, that's how I sort them out. I thought everyone had a similar process.

We all do, but many people's might not be as explicitly visual or spatial as yours is. I can sort of feel it in space but not really on any shape. I don't know how to describe it.

 

[Yorick]

I just remember dates as dates? Like if you say "June 16th" I say "Okay that's my birthday." February 13th. Okay that's my parent's anniversary. I don't categorise dates in any kind of system.

 

[Remus]

You mean to say that you don't place dates on a diagram in your head?

To put it simply... NO.

 

[MJ12]

I associate all previous months and years to a memory or feeling of that exact time. When I shelve magazines by date at my job I get very flustered and lost if I do not use this method.

 

[Stigmata]

I just remember dates as dates? Like if you say "June 16th" I say "Okay that's my birthday." February 13th. Okay that's my parent's anniversary. I don't categorise dates in any kind of system.

Rote memorisation with little to no structure? D: Whatever works for your mind I guess.

 

[Ennui]

I just remember dates as dates? Like if you say "June 16th" I say "Okay that's my birthday." February 13th. Okay that's my parent's anniversary. I don't categorise dates in any kind of system.

Yes, you do, regardless of whether you understand the system simply as "dates" or as a more complex mental construct. It's just like the inborn human mathematical ability - when your brain does math, it functions very differently from you doing math on paper, but you can't really tell the difference. It's how the brain works. You might not have specific mental categories but your brain organizes them with relation to each other somehow.

 

[Yorick]

Yes, you do, regardless of whether you understand the system simply as "dates" or as a more complex mental construct. It's just like the inborn human mathematical ability - when your brain does math, it functions very differently from you doing math on paper, but you can't really tell the difference. It's how the brain works. You might not have specific mental categories but your brain organizes them with relation to each other somehow.

Well, yes. I just meant that I don't have any kind of notable process like The Monkey has.

 

[Ennui]

Me either. I expect it has some semi-explicit structure but I can't really perceive it. It's definitely not nearly as spatial as The Monkey's. I do get impressions of relationships to other dates though, and a kind of sense of position, but not on something as specific as a circle or line.

 

[Krynn72]

I dont even know the correct order of the months, how am I supposed to draw it from memory?

 

[The Monkey]

You guys a strange

In the cases where I've met people who also use a circle it's always clockwise. I'm the only one having it counter-clockwise that I've met. Certain months are also much longer than others. It would be really interesting to find out why that is. Anyone got a Ph.D. in Psychology?

 

[Stigmata]

From an old thread:

Hoo boy, here comes the description of my number-line and calendar

Number Line
This line exists in a sort of pure-white space, like Purgatory, or that empty-space scene in The Matrix. It's nothing more than a flat, narrow, off-white surface, almost like an infinite strip of paper, extending off to infinity in both directions. The height doesn't vary, nor does the width, nor color. It's just a straight, flat, white surface with all integer values written on it (including negatives), each value existing in its own "square" on the line.

Calendar
This thing is far more extensive and unnecessarily detailed.

It starts in the same format as my number line - a narrow strip of numbers, except each number represents a year, and the calendar appears in 3D. From there, I can zoom in to a specific year (default is the current year), which then expands into a large loop. January is at the "base" of the loop, closest to the previous year's entry. The months are listed along the loop counter-clockwise, with June at the end closest to the next year. Each month takes up 1/12th of the loop.

From there, I can zoom in further to an individual month, which usually appears as a linear series of days, connecting the previous month with the next. I can also zoom in further to look at individual days and even individual hours. Saturdays and Sundays are raised higher than weekdays, and the Saturday and Sunday squares on the calendar-line are also darker, because I love night time, and I also like the weekend. Mondays are pure black though, because they suck, and pure darkness also sucks and scared me when I was a kid

When I zoom in to look at a single day, it becomes a series of hour-squares. Each hour-square is bordered with whatever weather phenomena I'm expecting, and each is also lit according to the time of day and the cloud cover.

Looking at this yearly calendar-loop at any previous level, the loop is bordered by seasonal weather and appropriately nostalgic objects. The winter months are bordered by snow and pine trees - Christmas has a Christmas tree on it. The spring months have a couple rainclouds, lots of nice grass, flowers, and May has a couple blue-ish mountains off to the side for some reason. The summer months are bordered by beaches, trees with sunlight filtering through the leaves, and there's also a lake/oceanfront where the beaches are. The fall months have cloud cover, fallen leaves, and trees with fall-leaf colours. Also, for some reason, August is also bordered by Pokemon videogame screenshots and videos of ReBoot.

Zooming back out to the year-line, and looking at past years, the line of years is bordered by historical events. 1939-1945 are bordered by a Howitzer, Hitler, Kamikaze pilots, Pearl Harbor, a Garand, a Sherman tank, and occasionally clips of Saving Private Ryan. The 60's are bordered by fields full of hippies listening to live concerts, and the Apollo missions. The 80's are bordered by blue suits, new-wave bands, and glitter. The early 90's are bordered by grunge bands. The late 90's and early 2000's are bordered by a dynamic collage of video-game screenshots and movies.

And in all of this, there is always the Sun casting light on my year. But this Sun bit is awesome, because it's all set up so that my calendar-loop/line exists where the Earth does in the solar system - the past years extending off towards Pluto, the future years extending towards the Sun. The background is filled with faint stars, and occasionally I can see the Moon, and the orbital paths of Mercury and Venus.

 

[Gemma]

I still don't get it :\

 

[Darkside55]

Yeah I seriously don't understand what's going on in this thread.

 

[VirusType2]

They have mental disabilities designated for people these special abilities.

 

[CyberPitz]

I just imagine a calendar....when a new month comes up, I just flip the imaginary page.

 

[Hazar]

like one of these?:

http://www.blahbleh.com/clock.php
http://www.blahbleh.com/clock3.php
http://www.blahbleh.com/clock7b.php

 

[Sheepo]

What what what what.

 

[Warped]

It be better if we just drew what we think we'll look like in 40 years time or photoshop our faces +40 years. that would be more fun and worthwhile

 

[evil^milk]

I associate all previous months and years to a memory or feeling of that exact time. When I shelve magazines by date at my job I get very flustered and lost if I do not use this method.

I do something like this, mostly related to listening to different types of music each month.

 

[AKIRA]

i too have wondered this very thing...funny how you think you're the only person who ever thinks of such things...humans are all alike, none of us are unique one bit, we all think the same and feel the same, society as a whole wants to make everyone think they're different from anyone else, but really, we're all the same.

 

[Gemma]

It be better if we just drew what we think we'll look like in 40 years time or photoshop our faces +40 years. that would be more fun and worthwhile

Can you do that, if so then f**king do it. right now NOWWW!

 

[VirusType2]

i too have wondered this very thing...funny how you think you're the only person who ever thinks of such things...humans are all alike, none of us are unique one bit, we all think the same and feel the same, society as a whole wants to make everyone think they're different from anyone else, but really, we're all the same.

no u. ur the same.

 

[Kamikazie]

From what your diagram looks like to me, you're asking us to draw how long the days/months/years seem to us? Like, your December is longer than January through May combined, so therefore you like December more than you like the Spring months? Or you like the weekend seems longer than your week?

Ah **** it, I'm getting some ice cream.

 

[Geogaddi]

I mean I guess I imagine it like this.

I'm proud to say we use nearly identical mental constructs to represent measures of time.

 

[AtomicSpark]

Spoiler

When it strikes Midnight, we're ****ed.

 

[The Monkey]

From what your diagram looks like to me, you're asking us to draw how long the days/months/years seem to us? Like, your December is longer than January through May combined, so therefore you like December more than you like the Spring months? Or you like the weekend seems longer than your week?

Ah **** it, I'm getting some ice cream.

I didn't choose to make the diagrams look like that, that's just how it appears in
my head, and have for as long as I can remember.