Humanity is 100 seconds from total annihilation. Again.
This is according to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a nonprofit and publication whose signature Doomsday Clock has estimated – in strict “minutes to midnight” terms – how close the world has been to the apocalypse since 1947.
“The collective wisdom of our group is that it is an extremely dangerous time with some incredibly important bright spots,” said Rachel Bronson, executive director and editor of the newsletter, on Wednesday.
The clock remains set to “100 seconds to midnight” – unchanged from last year, when its hands were moved as close to midnight as possible. At the time, the bulletin said that the change should reflect increased tensions and deteriorating communication between the United States and other countries, including Russia and Iran.
This year, scientists pointed to the poor response of world leaders to the coronavirus pandemic, the erosion of the public’s faith in science and government institutions, the acceleration of nuclear weapons programs and the persistent threat of climate change.
Time has been approaching midnight since 2018, when the clock was set at two minutes to 12h.
The last time it was so close was in 1953, after the United States and the Soviet Union tested their first thermonuclear weapons.
“Next year, as usual, we hope to keep the hands of the Doomsday Clock from midnight,” said Bronson.
The bulletin’s Science and Safety Council, made up of nuclear and climate experts and other scientists, meets twice a year to discuss how world events should dictate where the hands of the clock will fall.
They discuss whether humanity is safer or at greater risk than it was at the same time last year or compared with 75 years ago, said Dr. Bronson.
Even if scientists decide what time will be shown on the clock, it is not a scientific or even physical instrument, but symbolic.
And the annual alert generated some skepticism.
“If I’m being charitable, I mean, okay, they are part of a broader effort to focus collective attention on urgent issues or long-term things that can have catastrophic consequences, like climate change,” said Andrew Latham, professor of International Relations at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota.
“But it’s like the boy who screamed wolf,” he said. “After a certain period of time, we will not pay attention.”
The council has already projected optimism about the future of the world. In 1990, with the end of the Cold War, the clock was set at 10 minutes to midnight. The next year, it was 17 full minutes away, humanity farthest from the projected annihilation since the introduction of the Doomsday Clock.
(As the clock is not updated in real time, some geopolitical changes ended and were made too quickly to be recorded. In 1962, for example, its hands did not move in response to the Cuban missile crisis because “very little was known in time about the circumstances of the impasse or what the outcome would be ”, explains the bulletin on its website.)
The council said this year that there is reason to hope, pointing to President Biden’s decision to return to the Paris Agreement and his intention to return to the nuclear agreement with Iran.
On Tuesday, Biden and Russian President Vladimir V. Putin avoided a new arms race when they formally agreed to extend the latest nuclear weapons treaty between their countries.
“The election of an American president who recognizes climate change as a profound threat and supports international cooperation and science-based policies puts the world in a much better position to address global problems,” he said. Susan Solomon, professor of environmental studies at MIT and member of the bulletin’s scientific board.
Jerry Brown, the former California governor who is the executive president of the bulletin, said that political leaders have failed to convey to the public the real threat posed by nuclear weapons.
“It’s time to get real and stop building nuclear weapons and find a way to eliminate them from around the world,” said Brown, a Democrat, on Wednesday.
Mr. Brown added: “There are 100 seconds left until midnight. Wake up.”
Despite such proclamations, the public should not panic, Latham said.
The time shown on the Doomsday Clock is not based on an algorithm that analyzes objective data, he said, but on the concerns of smart and well-intentioned people using the available information and consulting each other.
The clock is “a relic of a bygone era, an artifact of an Armageddon mentality any minute,” said Latham.
Still, he added, there is no reason to ignore it.
“Once a year, it reminds us that there are some big dangers out there,” he said. “They are all man-made, and that means that they might be undone.”