Existence of Time

[circa 1991]

Question:  How do we know that time exists?  I know that clocks tell what 
time it currently is, and that we age as this so called "time" passes.  But 
what factual reason is there that explains HOW time exists, and if it truly 
does?  But what scientific reasons are there for its actual existence?
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Well, how do we know that anything exists?  We look around 
ourselves, observe the world, and come to some conclusions about it.  Time 
seems to be a very useful concept in making the world make sense.  Human 
observations of the world about us are perfectly acceptable scientific reasons 
for stating that time exists.  Science is incapable of proving anything, and 
although some people seem to think that some scientific theories are 
infallible, and therefore can be relied on to prove things about the world, 
such notions are really not compatible with true science - science rests on 
observation, NOT on theory.  Theory simply helps make sense of the 
observations.  The first thing in a scientific approach to anything is 
measurement.  Can we measure time?  Yes!  To fractions of a picosecond, these 
days.  But, if you want to hold out and claim that time does not exist, that 
it is all a figment of our imaginations, that in fact there is only one time 
ever, which is the present, and all the past never existed, well, that is up 
to you.

A. Smith
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