By Joe Donlon, Zak Spector
It was a small change, but a frightening one. Last month, the “Doomsday Clock” was moved up to 89 seconds, the closest the world has ever been to total annihilation.
The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, based at the University of Chicago, uses the clock as a metaphor to show how close the planet is to reaching human extinction.
Believe it or not, the goal of the Doomsday Clock isn’t to scare you. It’s to make you take action.
Despite the grim message the clock currently conveys, one of the people behind it is actually optimistic about humanity’s future.
University of Chicago professor Daniel Holz is one of the people who moved the Doomsday Clock forward last month. He’s the current chair of the Science and Security Board at the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, which has been tracking the risk of world destruction since atomic weapons were invented.
“It’s a symbolic thing. We’re trying to capture the urgency of the moment,” he said. “We’re at a moment of incredible danger. Everyone is freaked out. What are we doing? We need to turn the clock back.”
At this moment, Holz said humanity is threatened by nuclear weapons…
“We’re building more weapons, we’re modernizing the arsenal. Even though we have plenty of weapons to wipe out civilization many times over … we want even more and even better weapons. You can ask why, but we’re doing it, China’s doing it, Russia is doing it, the treaties are all going away,” he said.
Climate change…
“Climate change is happening. We just came off the hottest year on record. There are fires, there was floods, there’s extreme drought. There are extreme storms. It’s all happening. I don’t think anyone paying any attention has any doubt at this point that climate change is happening, and it’s getting worse,” Holz said.