AS OF TODAY, IT IS 3 MINUTES TO NUCLEAR MIDNIGHT.
WHAT DO THE POWERS THAT BE KNOW? ARE YOU PREPARED?
http://news.sciencemag.org/people-events/2015/01/bulletin-atomic-scientists-moves-doomsday-clock-2-minutes-closer-midnight
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The board that runs the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS) has decided to move the minute hand on its symbolic Doomsday Clock 2 minutes closer to disaster. The clock now shows 3 minutes before midnight because the “probability of global catastrophe is very high” as a result of continuing climate change and efforts to modernize nuclear weapons stockpiles.
“In 2015, unchecked climate change, global nuclear weapons modernizations, and outsized nuclear weapons arsenals pose extraordinary and undeniable threats to the continued existence of humanity,” the group said in a statement. “[W]orld leaders have failed to act with the speed or on the scale required to protect citizens from potential catastrophe. These failures of political leadership endanger every person on Earth.”
At a press conference in Washington, D.C., today, BAS Executive Director Kennette Benedict said accelerating climate change and stalled efforts to reduce nuclear weapons stockpiles had “equal weight” in pushing BAS’s Science and Security Board to reset the clock at 11:57 p.m.
“The reason we feel a greater sense of urgency on the climate issue is that if you want to limit climate change to a certain magnitude, you only have a finite amount of time before the emissions have to stop. Action has to happen soon, starting now, to reduce global emissions,” said Richard Somerville, a member of the board and a climate scientist at the University of California, San Diego.
There are too many nuclear weapons, added BAS board member Sharon Squassoni, a nonproliferation expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. The risk is not just that “someone is going to press the button,” she said. “The existence of these weapons takes a lot of time, effort, and money to keep them safe, and the bureaucracies are poised to keep these systems going indefinitely.”
The two threats can be linked, Benedict noted. For example, many nations are developing nuclear power to help reduce carbon emissions, potentially raising the risk of proliferating nuclear materials. Meanwhile, sea level rise caused by climate change may endanger nuclear power plants built on coastlines. “Taken together, [the trends] pose truly terrible prospects,” she said.
BAS officials say the last time the Doomsday Clock’s minute hand moved was in January 2012, when it was pushed ahead 1 minute from 6 to 5 minutes before midnight. Since its creation in 1947, the clock has been adjusted only 18 times, ranging from 2 minutes before midnight in 1953 to 17 minutes before midnight in 1991. Before today’s resetting, the clock read 11:57 p.m. just two times: in 1949 when the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb and in 1984 when tensions escalated between the United States and the Soviet Union.
“The urgency is real. We are not saying that it is too late to take actions, but the window for action is closing rapidly,” Benedict warns. “The choice is ours, and the clock is ticking.”
The board that makes the decision on where to set the clock includes more than 20 scientists, 17 of whom are Nobel laureates.
“In 2015, unchecked climate change, global nuclear weapons modernizations, and outsized nuclear weapons arsenals pose extraordinary and undeniable threats to the continued existence of humanity,” the group said in a statement. “[W]orld leaders have failed to act with the speed or on the scale required to protect citizens from potential catastrophe. These failures of political leadership endanger every person on Earth.”
At a press conference in Washington, D.C., today, BAS Executive Director Kennette Benedict said accelerating climate change and stalled efforts to reduce nuclear weapons stockpiles had “equal weight” in pushing BAS’s Science and Security Board to reset the clock at 11:57 p.m.
“The reason we feel a greater sense of urgency on the climate issue is that if you want to limit climate change to a certain magnitude, you only have a finite amount of time before the emissions have to stop. Action has to happen soon, starting now, to reduce global emissions,” said Richard Somerville, a member of the board and a climate scientist at the University of California, San Diego.
There are too many nuclear weapons, added BAS board member Sharon Squassoni, a nonproliferation expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. The risk is not just that “someone is going to press the button,” she said. “The existence of these weapons takes a lot of time, effort, and money to keep them safe, and the bureaucracies are poised to keep these systems going indefinitely.”
The two threats can be linked, Benedict noted. For example, many nations are developing nuclear power to help reduce carbon emissions, potentially raising the risk of proliferating nuclear materials. Meanwhile, sea level rise caused by climate change may endanger nuclear power plants built on coastlines. “Taken together, [the trends] pose truly terrible prospects,” she said.
BAS officials say the last time the Doomsday Clock’s minute hand moved was in January 2012, when it was pushed ahead 1 minute from 6 to 5 minutes before midnight. Since its creation in 1947, the clock has been adjusted only 18 times, ranging from 2 minutes before midnight in 1953 to 17 minutes before midnight in 1991. Before today’s resetting, the clock read 11:57 p.m. just two times: in 1949 when the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb and in 1984 when tensions escalated between the United States and the Soviet Union.
“The urgency is real. We are not saying that it is too late to take actions, but the window for action is closing rapidly,” Benedict warns. “The choice is ours, and the clock is ticking.”
The board that makes the decision on where to set the clock includes more than 20 scientists, 17 of whom are Nobel laureates.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2015/01/22/the-doomsday-clock-is-ticking-again-it-is-now-three-minutes-to-midnight-a-k-a-the-end-of-humanity/
Here is every time the Doomsday Clock has moved, and why, according to the Bulletin:
1947: 7 Minutes to Midnight
The Doomsday Clock is originally set by an artist. The Bulletin says on its site that the image of the clock, on the cover of its magazine, was supposed to capture "the urgency of the nuclear dangers that the magazine's founders -- and the broader scientific community -- are trying to convey to the public and political leaders around the world."
1949: 3 Minutes to Midnight
Alexander Langsdorf moves the minute hand up by four minutes after a Russian nuclear test. Here's what the magazine said at the time to explain the move: "We do not advise Americans that doomsday is near and that they can expect atomic bombs to start falling on their heads a month or year from now. But we think they have reason to be deeply alarmed and to be prepared for grave decisions."
1953: 2 Minutes to Midnight
The United States tests its first thermonuclear device in October 1952. This is the closest the clock has ever gotten to Doomsday.
1960: 7 Minutes to Midnight
"For the first time, the United States and Soviet Union appear eager to avoid direct confrontation in regional conflicts," the Bulletin says of this move backward from Doomsday. Among other things, the group specifically mentions the formation of several initiatives promoting international scientific cooperation.
1963: 12 Minutes to Midnight
The United States and the Soviet Union sign the Partial Test Ban Treaty, which bans atmospheric testing of nuclear devices. You can read the full text of that treaty here.
1968: 7 Minutes to Midnight
Lots of things contribute to this move: The Vietnam War. The India-Pakistan War of 1965. And nuclear weapons in France and China.
1969: 10 Minutes to Midnight
Most major world powers (but not Israel, India, and Pakistan) sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
1972: 12 Minutes to Midnight
The United States and Soviet Union sign a pair of treaties aimed at slowing the arms race: The Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT) and the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty.
1974: 9 Minutes to Midnight
India runs its first test of a nuclear device. And, the Bulletin adds, the United States and Soviet Union continue to modernize their own nuclear capabilities.
1980: 7 Minutes to Midnight
The Bulletin simply cites a lack of progress toward nuclear disarmament for this move, noting that the two global superpowers have "been behaving like what may best be described as 'nucleoholics'--drunks who continue to insist that the drink being consumed is positively 'the last one,' but who can always find a good excuse for 'just one more round.'"
1981: 4 Minutes to Midnight
Russia invades Afghanistan. The United States boycotts the Olympic Games in Moscow. And, the Bulletin notes, Ronald Reagan is elected president.
1984: 3 Minutes to Midnight
More pessimism over the state of diplomacy between the United States and the Soviet Union. "Every channel of communications has been constricted or shut down; every form of contact has been attenuated or cut off. And arms control negotiations have been reduced to a species of propaganda," writes the Bulletin.
1988: 6 Minutes to Midnight
Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev have signed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which bans a specific type of nuclear weapon.
1990: 10 Minutes to Midnight
The Berlin Wall falls, and Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Romania break out from Soviet control.
1991: 17 Minutes to Midnight
This is the farthest the clock's minute hand has been from doomsday, indicating the group's momentary optimism at the official end of the Cold War.
1995: 14 Minutes to Midnight
Maybe we were a little too optimistic, the Bulletin says. The group notes at the time that there are more than 40,000 nuclear weapons around the world.
1998: 9 Minutes to Midnight
Russia and the United States still have nuclear warheads aimed at each other, and India and Pakistan conduct rival nuclear tests.
2002: 7 Minutes to Midnight
America withdraws from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, 20 years after it was signed. The Bulletin's board is also concerned about "the enormous amount of unsecured -- and sometimes unaccounted for -- weapon-grade nuclear materials," as speculation spreads about the possibility of a nuclear terrorist attack.
2007: 5 Minutes to Midnight
North Korea tests a nuclear weapon, and the West is worried that Iran wants one, too. For the first time, the Bulletin mentions a second concern: climate change.
2010: 6 Minutes to Midnight
The United States and Russia are in talks to renew something akin to the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, and the Bulletin is slightly more optimistic on international efforts to combat climate change.
2012: 5 Minutes to Midnight
"The challenges to rid the world of nuclear weapons, harness nuclear power, and meet the nearly inexorable climate disruptions from global warming are complex and interconnected. In the face of such complex problems, it is difficult to see where the capacity lies to address these challenges," the Bulletin writes.
2015: 3 Minutes to Midnight.
Speaking of nuclear weapons modernization, climate change and the continued existence of nuclear weapons arsenals, the Bulletin writes that "world leaders have failed to act with the speed or on the scale required to protect citizens from potential catastrophe. These failures of political leadership endanger every person on Earth.”
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