CNN
–
78 years ago, several scientists created a unique type of clock, called the Watch of the Final Judgment (Doomsday Clock, in English), as a symbolic attempt to measure how close is humanity to destroy the world.
This Tuesday, the clock was set in 89 seconds for midnight, the closest position to that score in history, according to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, which established the clock in 1947. Midnight represents the moment in which the Human beings will have made the uninhabitable earth.
In the previous two years, Bulletin set the clock in 90 seconds for midnight, mainly due to Russia’s invasion to Ukraine, the possibility of a nuclear arms race, the conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and the climatic crisis.
The clock is not designed to definitively measure existential threats, but to generate conversations on complex scientific issues such as climate change, according to Bulletin.
“We moved the clock closer to midnight because we do not see enough positive progress against the global challenges we face, including nuclear risk, climate change, biological threats and advances in disruptive technologies,” such as artificial intelligence, he said Daniel Holz, president of the Bulletin Science and Security Board and professor of the Department of Physics, Astronomy and Astrophysics of the University of Chicago, during a press conference this Tuesday. “Countries that have nuclear weapons are increasing the size and role of their arsenals, investing hundreds of billions of dollars in weapons capable of destroying civilization several times,” he added.
The development of disruptive technologies, such as artificial intelligence, biotechnology and space exploration, has also widely exceeded regulation in those areas, added Holz.
“All these dangers are greatly aggravated by a powerful threat multiplier: the propagation of misinformation, false information and conspiracy theories that degrade the communicative ecosystem and increasingly blur the line between truth and falsehood,” he added.
The Bulletin of the 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 World War II.
Originally, the organization was created to measure nuclear threats, but in 2007 the Bulletin decided to include climate change in its calculations.
Throughout the last 78 years, the clock time has changed according to how close the scientists that are the human race of their total destruction are. Some years the time changes, and other years.
The final judgment clock is adjusted every year by experts from the Bulletin Science and Security Board in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which was first established by Albert Einstein in December 1948, with J. Robert Oppenheimer as his first president. Currently, the Board includes nine laureates with the Nobel Prize, many of them in Physics, Physiology or Medicine.
The clock has been an effective attention call by reminding people of the cascade that the planet faces, although some have questioned its usefulness.
“It is an imperfect metaphor,” he told CNN in 2022 Michael E. Mann, presidential distinguished professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences of the University of Pennsylvania, highlighting that the frame frame combines various types of risk that have different characteristics and occur in different time scales. Even so, he added that “it is still an important rhetorical device that reminds us, year after year, the precariousness of our current existence on this planet.”
“Each model has limitations,” said CNN in 2022 Eryn Macdonald, an analyst of the Global Security Program of the Union of Conscious Scientists, adding that Bulletin has made careful decisions every year to capture people’s attention to existential threats and the necessary actions.
“While I wish we could talk about minutes again for midnight instead of seconds, unfortunately that no longer reflects reality,” Macdonald said.
The clock has never reached midnight, and the president and CEO of Bulletin, Rachel Bronson, said he hopes he will never do it.
“When the clock marks midnight, that means that there has been some kind of nuclear exchange or a catastrophic climate change that has ended humanity (…) we never want to reach that point, and we will not know when it happens,” he explained.
Although the clock cannot measure threats exactly, if it generates conversations and encourages public participation in scientific issues such as climate change and nuclear disarmament, Bronson considers it a success.
When a new time is established on the clock, people pay attention, he explained. At the United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Glasgow, Scotland, in 2021, the then Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson, cited the Watch of the final judgment when talking about the climate crisis facing the world, Bronson pointed out.
Bronson said that people talk about whether they agree with the decision of Bulletin and maintain productive conversations about what are the driving forces of change.
Going back the clock with bold and concrete actions is still possible. In fact, the hands moved further from midnight – 17 minutes before the hour – in 1991, when the administration of the then president of the United States HW Bush signed the strategic weapons reduction treaty with the Soviet Union.
“In Bulletin we believe that, since humans created these threats, we can reduce them (…) But doing so is not easy, nor has it been. And it requires serious work and a global commitment to all levels of society, ”said Bronson.
Bronson advises not to underestimate the power to talk about these important issues with one.
“You may not feel it because you are not doing anything, but we know that public commitment moves leaders to do things,” he said.
Personal actions can make a difference. To have a positive impact on climate change, observe your daily habits and see if there are small changes that you can make in your life, such as the frequency with which you walk instead of driving and the heating of your home, Bronson said.
Eating local and seasonal products, reducing food waste, conserving water and recycling properly are other ways to help mitigate or address the effects of the climatic crisis.
(Tagstotranslate) Instagia
Source link
