[D66] Doomsday clock 2020 press release

[A.OUT]

https://thebulletin.org/doomsday-clock/current-time/

Press Release—IT IS NOW 100 SECONDS TO MIDNIGHT

By Gayle Spinazze, January 23, 2020

Doomsday Clock Now Closer to Midnight Than Ever in Its History; Bulletin 
of the Atomic Scientists Cite Worsening Nuclear Threat, Lack of Climate 
Action & Rise of “Cyber-Enabled Disinformation Campaigns” in Moving 
Clock Hand; Bulletin Joined by The Elders in Announcement Today.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – January 23, 2020 – The iconic Doomsday Clock 
symbolizing the gravest perils facing humankind is now closer to 
midnight than at any point since its creation in 1947. To underscore the 
need for action, the time on the Doomsday Clock is now being expressed 
in seconds, rather than minutes: Today, the Bulletin of the Atomic 
Scientists’ Science and Security Board in consultation with the 
Bulletin’s Board of Sponsors, which includes 13 Nobel Laureates, moved 
the Doomsday Clock from two minutes to midnight to 100 seconds to midnight.

As the statement issued today by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 
explains: “Humanity continues to face two simultaneous existential 
dangers—nuclear war and climate change—that are compounded by a threat 
multiplier, cyber-enabled information warfare, that undercuts society’s 
ability to respond. The international security situation is dire, not 
just because these threats exist, but because world leaders have allowed 
the international political infrastructure for managing them to erode.”

The Doomsday Clock has now moved closer to midnight in three of the last 
four years. While the Doomsday Clock did not move in 2019, its minute 
hand was set forward in 2018 by 30 seconds, to two minutes before 
midnight. The Clock was adjusted in 2017 to two and a half minutes to 
midnight from its previous setting of three minutes to midnight.

Rachel Bronson, president and CEO, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 
said: “It is 100 seconds to midnight. We are now expressing how close 
the world is to catastrophe in seconds – not hours, or even minutes. It 
is the closest to Doomsday we have ever been in the history of the 
Doomsday Clock. We now face a true emergency – an absolutely 
unacceptable state of world affairs that has eliminated any margin for 
error or further delay.”

Former California Governor Jerry Brown, executive chair, Bulletin of the 
Atomic Scientists, said: “Dangerous rivalry and hostility among the 
superpowers increases the likelihood of nuclear blunder. Climate change 
just compounds the crisis. If there’s ever a time to wake up, it’s now.”

For the first time, experts from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 
were joined in making the Doomsday Clock change by members of The 
Elders. Founded by Nelson Mandela in 2007, The Elders are independent 
global leaders working together for peace and human rights.

Former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, deputy chair, The Elders; and 
former South Korean Foreign Minister, said: “We share a common concern 
over the failure of the multilateral system to address the existential 
threats we face. From the US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement and the 
Iran Nuclear Deal, to deadlock at nuclear disarmament talks and division 
at the UN Security Council – our mechanisms for collaboration are being 
undermined when we need them most.”

Former President of Ireland Mary Robinson, chair, The Elders, and former 
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said: “We ask world leaders to 
join us in 2020 as we work to pull humanity back from the brink. The 
Doomsday Clock now stands at 100 seconds to midnight, the most dangerous 
situation that humanity has ever faced. Now is the time to come together 
– to unite and to act.”

The Doomsday Clock statement highlights three worsening factors:

· Nuclear weapons. “In the nuclear realm, national leaders have ended or 
undermined several major arms control treaties and negotiations during 
the last year, creating an environment conducive to a renewed nuclear 
arms race, to the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and to lowered 
barriers to nuclear war. Political conflicts regarding nuclear programs 
in Iran and North Korea remain unresolved and are, if anything, 
worsening. US-Russia cooperation on arms control and disarmament is all 
but nonexistent.”

· Climate change. “Public awareness of the climate crisis grew over the 
course of 2019, largely because of mass protests by young people around 
the world. Just the same, governmental action on climate change still 
falls far short of meeting the challenge at hand. At UN climate meetings 
last year, national delegates made fine speeches but put forward few 
concrete plans to further limit the carbon dioxide emissions that are 
disrupting Earth’s climate. This limited political response came during 
a year when the effects of manmade climate change were manifested by one 
of the warmest years on record, extensive wildfires, and 
quicker-than-expected melting of glacial ice.”

· Cyber-based disinformation. “Continued corruption of the information 
ecosphere on which democracy and public decision making depend has 
heightened the nuclear and climate threats. In the last year, many 
governments used cyber-enabled disinformation campaigns to sow distrust 
in institutions and among nations, undermining domestic and 
international efforts to foster peace and protect the planet.”

At the same time, the Doomsday Clock statement also identifies possible 
action steps to turn back the hands of the Clock.

· US and Russian leaders can return to the negotiating table to: 
reinstate the INF Treaty or take other action to restrain an unnecessary 
arms race in medium-range missiles; extend the limits of New START 
beyond 2021; seek further reductions in nuclear arms; discuss a lowering 
of the alert status of the nuclear arsenals of both countries; limit 
nuclear modernization programs that threaten to create a new nuclear 
arms race; and start talks on cyber warfare, missile defenses, the 
militarization of space, hypersonic technology, and the elimination of 
battlefield nuclear weapons.

· The countries of the world should publicly rededicate themselves to 
the temperature goal of the Paris climate agreement, which is 
restricting warming “well below” 2 degrees Celsius higher than the 
preindustrial level. That goal is consistent with consensus views on 
climate science, and, notwithstanding the inadequate climate action to 
date, it may well remain within reach if major changes in the worldwide 
energy system and land use are undertaken promptly. If that goal is to 
be attained, industrialized countries will need to curb emissions 
rapidly, going beyond their initial, inadequate pledges and supporting 
developing countries so they can leapfrog the entrenched, fossil 
fuel-intensive patterns previously pursued by industrialized countries.

· The United States and other signatories of the Iran nuclear deal can 
work together to restrain nuclear proliferation in the Middle East. Iran 
is poised to violate key thresholds of the deal.

· The international community should begin multilateral discussions 
aimed at establishing norms of behavior, both domestic and 
international, that discourage and penalize the misuse of science. 
Science provides the world’s searchlight in times of fog and confusion. 
Furthermore, focused attention is needed to prevent information 
technology from undermining public trust in political institutions, in 
the media, and in the existence of objective reality itself. 
Cyber-enabled information warfare is a threat to the common good. 
Deception campaigns—and leaders intent on blurring the line between fact 
and politically motivated fantasy—are a profound threat to effective 
democracies, reducing their ability to address nuclear weapons, climate 
change, and other existential dangers.

December 2020 marks the 75th anniversary of the first edition of the 
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, initially a six-page, black-and-white 
bulletin and later a magazine, created in anticipation that the atom 
bomb would be “only the first of many dangerous presents from the 
Pandora’s Box of modern science.”

MEDIA CONTACTS: Alex Frank, (703) 276-3264 and afrank at hastingsgroup.com, 
or Max Karlin, (703) 276-3255 and mkarlin at hastingsgroup.com.