Looking at the history, it suggests we need rapid, drastic improvements ASAP. Not many have been made at all since 1991, and there's been a lot of new problems cropping up and neglect of older...
Looking at the history, it suggests we need rapid, drastic improvements ASAP. Not many have been made at all since 1991, and there's been a lot of new problems cropping up and neglect of older ones. Every year without progress is a multiplier for global-warming-related doom, requiring more and more drastic measures to break-even on that delay.
I'm worried the clock is broken and it's already past midnight (in that we can't avoid a doomsday) and we're in denial.
Editor’s note: Founded in 1945 by Albert Einstein and University of Chicago scientists who helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists created the Doomsday Clock two years later, using the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero) to convey threats to humanity and the planet. The Doomsday Clock is set every year by the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which includes 13 Nobel laureates. The Clock has become a universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to catastrophe from nuclear weapons, climate change, and disruptive technologies in other domains.
Looking at the history, it suggests we need rapid, drastic improvements ASAP. Not many have been made at all since 1991, and there's been a lot of new problems cropping up and neglect of older ones. Every year without progress is a multiplier for global-warming-related doom, requiring more and more drastic measures to break-even on that delay.
I'm worried the clock is broken and it's already past midnight (in that we can't avoid a doomsday) and we're in denial.
From the editor's note: