The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, as it did last year, has set its "Doomsday Clock" to 90 seconds to midnight - a theoretical reference to the fact that the end of the Earth is closer than ever.
An employee points to the minute hand on the “Doomsday Clock” in Washington, DC, on January 23, 2024. Photo: AP
“Hotspots of conflict around the world pose the threat of nuclear escalation, climate change is already causing death and destruction, and disruptive technologies like AI and biotechnology are advancing faster than their safeguards,” said Rachel Bronson, president of the body that publishes the scientific publication. He added that keeping the clock the same as last year “is not a sign that the world is stabilizing.”
The Chicago-based nonprofit created the clock in 1947 during the tense Cold War period following World War II to warn the public about how close humanity was to destroying the world.
On Tuesday, the organization said worrying trends continued toward disaster, including that China, Russia and the United States were all spending large sums to expand or modernize their nuclear arsenals, increasing the risk of nuclear war due to mistake or miscalculation.
The massive war between Russia and Ukraine, which will mark its second anniversary next month, has raised tensions with the West and the East to their most dangerous levels since the Cold War. “A lasting end to Russia’s war in Ukraine seems far off, and the use of nuclear weapons by Russia in that conflict remains a strong possibility,” Bronson said. “Russia has sent a number of worrying nuclear signals over the past year.”
Bronson cited Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision in February 2023 to suspend Russia's participation in the START nuclear arms control treaty with the United States. The United States and Russia together hold nearly 90% of the world's nuclear warheads, enough to destroy the planet many times over.
Israel also has nuclear weapons and has been fighting Hamas in Gaza for nearly four months. "As a nuclear state, Israel's activities are clearly relevant to the Doomsday Clock discussion," Bronson added.
Climate change has been added as a contributing factor to the clock being set closer to “Doomsday.” “The world in 2023… experienced its hottest year on record, and global greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise. Global and North Atlantic sea surface temperatures both broke records, and Antarctic sea ice reached its lowest daily extent since satellite records began,” Bronson said.
While 2023 will be a record year for clean energy, with $1.7 trillion in new investment, total investment in fossil fuels is close to $1 trillion, Bronson said. Bronson called current efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions “entirely inadequate to avoid the dangerous human and economic impacts of climate change, which disproportionately affect the world’s poorest people.”
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was founded in 1945 by scientists including Albert Einstein and J. Robert Oppenheimer.
Hoang Anh (according to AP, Reuters, CBC)
Source
Comment (0)