PUBLISHER’S NOTE
Ron Stephens, Q-Tech Corporation
Does anybody really know what
time it is?
Precise timekeeping is of the utmost importance in science and technology and has been since the beginning of recorded time. Yet no one really knows what time is. If you look up the word “time” in a good dictionary, you will see one of the longest entries, with dozens of definitions. In 400 AD, St. Augustine said, “What, then, is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I wish to explain to him who
Deep Space Atomic Clock Moves Toward Increased Spacecraft Autonomy
6
COTS Journal | June 2023
asks, I know not.” Time is what a clock measures. The first clocks were natural phenomena like the sun rising and setting and the motions of the stars in the heavens. Sundials were developed, and then water clocks and sand-filled hourglasses. Later, pendulum clocks became the ultimate in precision. Physicists needed accurate clocks to measure natural phenomena, and accurate