Uchronias, like utopias before them, have a central social function to fulfil: they contain proposed solutions to particular unsolved problems in a society. 'Utopias?', asks Hans Magnus Enzensberger, we cannot see them. We only feel them like a knife in our backs.'And it is strange how familiar the knives in our backs feel, as if they had been sticking there for a long time. The first knife is sharpened on the unsolved problems of an insatiable economy of time. After it has proved possible to produce more in less time, it is now a question of doing more, fitting in more work and leisure activities in potentially less time. The increase in productivity results in an increase in consumption – more consumer goods, leisure activities and journeys, more entertainment, communication and information contend for spans of attention and time to expend. Production presses for destruction, and rituals of destruction can be arranged in diverse ways, preformed by the archaic figure of the sacrifice. Consumption is a harmless form of destruction in comparison, even though the mountains of refuse are piling up. The uchronia which only demands more time does not escape the quantitative logic of money and its accumulation. Money and time remain substitutable, but the general money preference will predominate even when more time is demanded. More can also be got out of living time and more can be made of life. 'Squeeze out the 150%', they say in the USA. It will soon be more. Self-exploitation or drug? Both interpretations are permissible, but the knife turns in the back
The Longing for the Moment
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