The Almagest
Kriss Moore
A graphical representation of how close we are to the end of the world has been produced every year, since when the clock debuted 67 years ago. Known as the Doomsday Clock, it was originally created by the wife of one of the researchers who worked on the atomic bomb, a lady named Martyl Langsdorf, who actually passed away in 2013. Her creation was originally set at 11.53, seven minutes away from doom, but in 2012 after the Fukushima incident in Japan, and in light of concerns about climate change, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists who create the clock each year moved its hand forward to 11:55.
For 2014, the hand remains in place, as the Bulletin feel that there has been little let up in the threats to civilization that are currently at large in the world. Stilted relations between major nuclear powers the US and Russia as a result of Russia harbouring Edward Snowden (Obama consequently cancelled a summit with Vladimir Putin), along with environmental issues contributed to the decision to keep the clock in its current position.
The highlights and lowlights in the clock’s history fell in 1991, when it went all the way back to 17 minutes to midnight at the end of the cold war, and in 1953 when it was moved to 11:58 following the tests on the first hydrogen bomb. Since the end of the cold war, however, it has only moved in one direction – towards midnight.
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