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The Doomsday Clock, which has been ticking for 77 years, is no ordinary clock. We are trying to measure how close humanity is to the destruction of the world.
On Tuesday, the clock was again set at 90 seconds to midnight. According to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, who created the clock in 1947, it was the closest ever to that time. Midnight represents the moment of human creation. An uninhabitable earth.Last year, the Bulletin set the clock to 90 seconds to midnight. This is mainly due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the increased risk of nuclear escalation.
From 2020 to 2022, the clock was set to 100 seconds to midnight.
The paper said the clock was not designed to definitively measure existential threats, but rather to spark conversations about difficult scientific topics such as climate change.
The decision to set clocks to the same time this year was primarily due to continued concerns about the Ukraine war, the Israel-Gaza conflict, the potential for a nuclear arms race, and the climate crisis, the company’s president and chief executive officer said. (CEO) Rachel Bronson said. He said at a press conference announcing the breaking news Tuesday time.
“Trends continue to point ominously toward global catastrophe,” Bronson added. “A war in Ukraine poses an ever-present risk of nuclear escalation. And the October 7 attack on Israel and war in Gaza further highlight the horrors of modern warfare, even without nuclear escalation.” I have to.
“Nuclear-weapon states are undertaking modernization programs that threaten to create a new nuclear arms race,” Bronson said. “Earth experienced its hottest year on record, with massive floods, fires and other climate-related disasters taking hold. And lack of action on climate change threatens billions of lives and livelihoods.” .”
Bronson cited recent advances in artificial intelligence as another concern, saying they “raise a variety of questions about how we control technology that can improve or threaten civilization in countless ways.” ”
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was founded as follows: A group of scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project, the code name for the development of the atomic bomb during World War II.
Initially, the organization was conceived to measure nuclear threats, but in 2007 the Bulletin decided to include climate change in its calculations.
Over the past 77 years, the clock has changed depending on how close scientists believe humanity is to complete extinction. Some years the time changes, some years it doesn’t.
The Doomsday Clock is set annually by experts from the magazine’s Science and Security Committee, in consultation with a committee of sponsors that currently includes nine Nobel laureates.
While the clock has been an effective wake-up call in terms of reminding people of the cascading crises facing the planet, some have questioned its usefulness.
“It’s an incomplete metaphor,” Michael E. Mann, Presidential Distinguished Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania, told CNN in 2022. He emphasized that it is a combination of different timescales. Still, he added, it “remains an important rhetorical device that year after year reminds us of the tenuousness of our current existence on this planet.”
Erin MacDonald, an analyst with the Union of Concerned Scientists’ Global Security Program, told CNN in 2022 that all models have limitations, and that the newsletter is a way for people to understand existential threats and necessary actions. He added that they make thoughtful decisions every year about how to get their attention.
“I wish we could go back to talking about minutes to midnight instead of seconds, but unfortunately that no longer reflects reality,” she says.
The clock has never struck midnight, but Bronson hopes it never does.
“When the clock strikes midnight, it means either a nuclear exchange that wipes out humanity or catastrophic climate change,” she says. “we You never want to get there and you won’t know it when you actually get there. ”
The time on the clock is not intended to measure threats, but rather to spark conversation and encourage public engagement on scientific topics such as climate change and nuclear disarmament.
If the watch can do that, Bronson considers it a success.
When a new time is set on the clock, people listen, she said. At the COP26 climate change talks held in Glasgow, UK in 2021, Mr Bronson pointed out that Prime Minister Boris Johnson referred to the Doomsday Clock when talking about the climate crisis facing the world.
Bronson said he hopes people can discuss whether they agree with the bulletin’s decisions and have a fruitful conversation about what the drivers of change are.
move It is still possible to turn back the clock with bold, concrete action. What actually moved was The farthest time from midnight, 17 minutes before the hour, in 1991. President George H.W. Bush’s administration signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with the Soviet Union. In 2016, due to the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris climate agreement, the clock was 3 minutes before midnight.
“We at the Bulletin believe that humans created these threats and that we can reduce them,” Bronson said. “But doing so is not easy, and never has been. And it will require serious effort and global engagement at all levels of society.”
Don’t underestimate the power of discussing these important issues with your colleagues, Bronson says.
“You may not feel it because you are not doing anything, but we know that public engagement moves leaders to action,” she says.
to make a positive impact Bronson said look at your daily habits and see if there are small changes you can make in your life, such as how often you walk vs. drive or how you heat your home.
Eating seasonally and locally, reducing food waste and recycling properly are also ways to mitigate or address the effects of the climate crisis.
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