It can be spent, bought, wasted and cheated, but do we really understand the concept of time? BBC World begins a season of programmes exploring the many facets of time, from how it began to the craft of clock-making to time management.
Eternal questions about how it began are addressed in Stephen Hawking's Universe (BBC World, 8.10pm) in which the famed Cambridge astrophysicist (pictured) and others in his field explain the mysteries that lie beyond our world.
The first episode, Seeing Is Believing, begins a journey through cosmology, tracing the history of astronomical theories and technology from the Ancient Greeks through to Galileo, Newton, Einstein and Hubble. For those who can't get their minds round the technical details of cosmology, New York physicist Michio Kaku tries to come to the rescue.
'Some people say, at the instant of the Big Bang, the universe was a dot. The new picture is that it is like a bowl of noodles,' he explains.
How we manage the time those noodles gave us is the topic of How To Beat The Clock (BBC World, 9.10pm). Shops are full of books, diaries and electronic gizmos all claiming they will help transform life by improving time-management skills. But does time-management work? David Stafford puts the experts to the test. In Silicon Valley, the world's Time Deprivation capital, he meets professional organiser Gunilla Koch who makes a fortune out of helping obsessive microgeeks who have loads of money but no time for themselves or others. She does things like stick their photos in their albums, pick up their laundry or buy flowers for their mums.
Stafford also meets Hyrum Smith and Steven Covey, authors of the business book The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People. Their company now turns over US$500 million (about HK$3.9 billion) a year helping others manage time.