Sixty-eight years ago, scientists have created a unique type of watch called the Doomsday clock as a symbolic attempt to assess the proximity of humanity to destroy the world.
On Tuesday, the stopwatch was set at 89 seconds at midnight, the closest to the world was ever of this marker, according to the bulletin of atomic scientists, which established the clock in 1947.
Midnight represents the moment when people have returned the land uninhabitable.
In the previous two years, the bulletin set the stopwatch of 90 seconds at midnight mainly due to the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, the potential of a nuclear arms race, the conflict of Israel-Hamas in Gaza and the climate crisis.
The clock is not designed to definitively measure existential threats but rather to trigger conversations on difficult scientific subjects such as climate change, according to the bulletin.
“We have brought the timer closer to midnight because we do not see sufficient and positive progress on the global challenges we face, in particular nuclear risk, climate change, biological threats and the progress of disturbing technologies” such as the 'Artificial intelligence, said Daniel Holz, the Bulletin Chairman of the Council of Sciences and Security and professor in the Department of Physics, Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of Chicago, in a press briefing on Tuesday. “Countries that have nuclear weapons increase the size and role of their arsenals, investing hundreds of billions of dollars in weapons which can destroy civilization on several occasions.”
The progress in the development of “disruptive technologies”, such as artificial intelligence, biotechnology and in space, have also exceeded regulations in these areas, added Holz.
“All these dangers are greatly exacerbated by a powerful multiplier of threat to spreading disinformation, disinformation and conspiracy theories which degrade the communication ecosystem and increasingly blur the border between truth and lies”, added Holz.
What is the Doomsday clock?
The bulletin of atomic scientists was founded by a group of scientists who worked on the Manhattan project, the code name for the development of the atomic bomb during the Second World War.
Originally, the organization was designed to measure nuclear threats, but in 2007, the bulletin made the decision to include climate change in its calculations.
Over the past 78 years, the clock time has changed according to the proximity that scientists believe that the human race is in total destruction. Some years, time changes, and some years it is not the case.
The Doomsday clock is defined each year by experts from the Bulletin's Science and Security Board in consultation with its board of directors, which was created for the first time by Albert Einstein in December 1948, with J. Robert Oppenheimer as the first president.
The board of directors currently includes nine winners of the Nobel Prize, many of whom in physics, physiology or medicine.
The clock was an effective awakening when it comes to reminding people of the cascade crises with which the planet is confronted, but some have questioned its usefulness.
“It is an imperfect metaphor,” said Michael E. Mann, a distinguished professor, in the Department of Earth Sciences in 2022. However, he added that “remains an important rhetorical apparatus which reminds us, year after year, of the tenuous of our current existence on this planet”.
Each model has constraints, Eryn Macdonald, analyst with the union of the World Security Program of Scientists concerned, said in 2022, adding that the bulletin made thought of thought each year on how to attract people's attention to Existential threats and the action required.
“Although I want us to come back to talk about a few minutes at midnight instead of seconds, unfortunately, that no longer reflects reality,” said Macdonald.
What happens if the clock reaches midnight?
The clock has never reached midnight and the president and chief executive officer of the bulletin, Rachel Bronson, said that she hoped that it will never be.
“When the clock is at midnight, it means that there has been a kind of catastrophic nuclear exchange or climate change that annihilated humanity,” she said. “We never really want to get there, and we will not know when we will.”
What is the precision of the clock?
Although the clock cannot measure threats, if it triggers conversation and encourages public engagement in scientific subjects such as climate change and nuclear disarmament, Bronson considers it as a success.
When a new time is defined on the clock, people listen, she said. During the United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Glasgow, Scotland in 2021, the Prime Minister of E-UK, Boris Johnson, cited the Doomsday clock speaking of the climate crisis which is confronted, noted Bronson.
Bronson said that she hoped that people will discuss their agreement with the bulletin's decision and that fruitful talks on the change forces of change are.
Replacing the clock with daring concrete actions is always possible. In fact, the hand moved away from midnight a huge 17 minutes before the time in 1991, when the administration of George HW Bush, then president, signed the Treaty of Reduction of Strategic Weapons with the Union Soviet.
What can individuals do to bring time on the clock?
“We, in the bulletin, think that because humans have created these threats, we can reduce them,” said Bronson. “But that is not easy, and it has never been. And it requires serious work and global commitment to all levels of society.”
Do not underestimate the power to talk about these important problems with your peers, said Bronson.
“You may not feel it because you do nothing, but we know that the public commitment makes the leader move (a) to do things,” she said.
Personal actions can make a difference. To have a positive impact on climate change, look at your daily habits and see if there are small changes that you can make in your life, like the frequency to which you work in relation to driving and how your home is heated , said Bronson.
Eating seasonally and local, correctly reducing food waste, water conservation and recycling are other ways to mitigate or manage the effects of the climate crisis.
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