On January 22, 2015, the Doomsday Clock was moved from 5 to only 3 minutes to midnight
The Doomsday Clock was created in 1947 by atomic scientists who had participated in the Manhattan Project. They were in shock by the impact of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In 1945 they founded the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists in order to alert people to the dangers of nuclear weapons and the need to abolish them. Over the 70 years since then the Bulletin has published without interruption and has welcomed other scientists who are working on nuclear power and climate change to join them and more precisely describe the existential risk humanity is facing.
The decision to move the hand of the doomsday clock closer to midnight was made by over 20 scientists, 17 of whom are Nobel Laureates. They declared: “Unchecked climate change, global nuclear weapons modernizations, and outsized nuclear weapons arsenals pose extraordinary and undeniable threats to the continued existence of humanity”
This program is the recording of the press conference held by the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on January 22, 2015.
Speakers were:
Kennette Benedict, the outgoing executive director and publisher of the Bulletin
Richard Somerville, Research Professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography
Sivan Kartha, senior scientist at the Stockholm Environment Institute
and
Sharon Squassoni. She directs the Proliferation Prevention Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 28:58 — 19.9MB)
