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The
Truth
In the
late 1940’s, a group of renowned scientists formed the Doomsday Clock.
This Clock reflects the current changes worldwide that could inflict
horrendous harm. The Doomsday Clock monitors not only nuclear trouble
signs, but also environmental and scientific changes. The Board of
Directors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has perpetuated this
clock as a symbolic metaphor. The strike of midnight reflects the end of
civilization.
The clock has had some
variances during the years. To mark relatively safer times, the clock
was set back to 17 minutes to midnight in 1991. The closest the hands of
the clock were to midnight was in 1953. At that time, it was moved to
two minutes until twelve o’clock. This was due to the rising tension
between the United States and the Soviet Union. Both countries were
actively testing the hydrogen bomb. Since 1947, the hands have been
adjusted 19 times. The last time the clock was moved was on January 17,
2007 to reflect five minutes until midnight. |
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It's 5 minutes to Midnight.
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The group has moved the
minute hand on its famous "Doomsday Clock" two minutes closer to
midnight. The concept timepiece, devised by the Bulletin of the
Atomic Scientists, now stands at five minutes to the hour. The clock was
first featured by the magazine 60 years ago, shortly after the US
dropped its A-bombs on Japan. Not since the darkest days of the Cold War
has the Bulletin, which covers global security issues, felt the need to
place the minute hand so close to midnight.
The decision to move it came after BAS directors and affiliated
scientists held discussions to reassess the idea of doomsday and what
posed the most grievous threats to civilisation.
Growing global nuclear instability has led humanity to the brink of a
"Second Nuclear Age," the group concluded, and the threat posed by
climate change is second only to that posed by nuclear weapons. |
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