Time is a river with no banks

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By Cheng, Ran + Shen, Qianshi

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For numerous years, the river has been passing through the city. Waves roll back with strengths and run eastwards along the ship’s rail. Business expands by the docking of the ship. 

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On Qingfen Street in Hankou, the infants are calmed by the heat in the air and the old men, comfortable in long sleeve tops, wake up and fall asleep to the water sounds. What is the difference between today and tomorrow? Anyone who earns it, knows well that time passes like the river. A person can only grab the present. 

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I rent three LED screens and control them via a five-year-old Mac with an electric watch besides. The first screen flashes once every second, and the second starts to flash on the sixtieth flash of the first screen and continues flashing once every minute. Likewise, the third screen begins to flash on the sixtieth flash of the previous one and goes on flashing once every hour. The start and end of a second is timed to an electronic watch that does not necessarily match the Chinese Standard Time (CST), with every single flash lasting for one-fifth of a second.

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Even though the electric watch matches the CST, its precision could decay due to fluctuations of the urban voltage, mechanical aging, and delays in signal transmission, let alone the reliability of the method above in visually displaying the passage of time. 

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On second thought, does this whole scenario give birth to a singularity or an illusion-within-an-illusion?

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And if not, what is there to sigh for?

 

 

时间是无岸之河

 

文/程然 沈乾石

 

江水流经此地不知道多少年了。含着劲回卷，随船舷向东离开，船一靠岸生意就起来了。

汉口清芬街的社区里被热弄静的婴儿、穿着长袖不流汗老人，在哗啦啦的声音里面醒来睡去。今天跟明天能有多大不一样，只要是付出了代价的人，都明白水跟时间一样从来是失去，每天就是每天的事情。

 

三块租来的LED的屏，通电后使用数据线连接一台五年前买的mac，然后在mac上使用软件统一控制。第一块每秒闪动一次，五十九次闪动后，第二块屏跟随第一块屏的第六十次闪动，闪动一次；第二块每分闪动一次，五十九次闪动后，第三块屏跟随第二块屏的第六十次闪动，闪动一次；每秒的开始结束，以房间内放置的一块不知是否与东八区标准时间吻合的电子表为准。单次闪动从零点零零秒开始，在五分之一秒处结束。

 

即使是东八区的“标准时间”，也可能因为城市电压的波动、机器的老化、信号传输的延迟而逐渐失准，更不用提上面这一套办法能否精确的跟上，再以视觉的方式提示时间的前移了。

 

转过来想，我们是不是用这套东西创造了一个新的奇点，又制造了幻觉中的幻觉。

 

即使不是，又能惋叹什么呢。