In this paper we articulate how time and temporalities are involved in the making of living things. For these purposes, we draw on an instructive episode concerning Norfolk Horn sheep. We attend to historical debates over the nature of the breed, whether it is extinct or not, and whether presently living exemplars are faithful copies of those that came before. We argue that there are features to these debates that are important to understanding contemporary configurations of life, time, and the organism, especially as these are articulated within the field of synthetic biology. In particular, we highlight how organisms are configured within different material and semiotic assemblages that are always structured temporally. While we identify three distinct structures, namely the historical, phyletic, and molecular registers, we do not regard the list as exhaustive. We also highlight how these structures are related to the care and value invested in the organisms at issue. Finally, because we are interested ultimately in ways of producing time, our subject matter requires us to think about historiographical practice reflexively. This draws us into dialogue with other scholars interested in time, not just historians, but also philosophers and sociologists, and into conversations with them about time as always multiple and never an inert background.

中文翻译：

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生命、时间和有机体：生命形式构建中的时间记录

在这篇论文中，我们阐明了时间和时间如何参与生物的创造。出于这些目的，我们借鉴了有关诺福克角羊的指导性插曲。我们参与关于该品种性质的历史辩论，它是否已经灭绝，以及目前活着的样本是否是以前那些的忠实副本。我们认为，这些辩论的某些特征对于理解生命、时间和有机体的当代配置很重要，尤其是在合成生物学领域中。特别是，我们强调了有机体如何在总是按时间结构的不同材料和符号组合中进行配置。虽然我们确定了三种不同的结构，即历史、系统和分子登记册，我们认为这份清单并不详尽。我们还强调了这些结构如何与对所讨论的生物体投入的护理和价值相关。最后，因为我们最终对生产时间的方式感兴趣，我们的主题要求我们反思性地思考史学实践。这吸引我们与其他对时间感兴趣的学者进行对话，不仅是历史学家，还有哲学家和社会学家，并与他们谈论时间总是多重的，从来没有惰性背景。