06 December 2023 , 16:31
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The Doomsday Clock is said to warn of catastrophe in the coming year - after 2023 has seen the world entrenched in war, natural disasters, political strife and more.
The symbolic device was created in part by scientists and engineers who helped on the infamous Manhattan Project back in 1947. After building the US' first nuclear bombs they began the initiative to keep a track of how close the world was getting to doomsday.
The clock's hands tick ever closer to midnight, with midnight representing the point at which the Earth becomes uninhabitable. As things stand, they are the closest they have ever been to midnight at 90 second away. It's updated annually by Chicago-based non-profit organisation the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists and the clock tracks apocalyptic threats arising from geopolitical tensions, the climate crisis, and weapons of mass destruction.
Last year, events such as Russia's invasion of Ukraine may have contributed to the clock's progress - but in recent years it has also reflected the threat of climate change globally.
Members of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists stand with the 2023 Doomsday Clock (Getty Images)Rachel Bronson, the CEO of the Bulletin, said: "When the clock is at midnight, that means there's been some sort of nuclear exchange or catastrophic climate change that's wiped out humanity. We never really want to get there and we won't know it when we do."
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On 24 January 2023, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists edged the hands of the Doomsday Clock forward. The clock now stands at 90 seconds to midnight – the closest it has been since 1947. This means, next year it may not take much to tip the planet into catastrophe and we could see even more negative events than we have so far over the past 300 plus days in 2023.
The Science and Security Board of the Bulletin warned that the world had entered "a time of unprecedented danger", owing significantly - but not exclusively - to the "exceedingly" dangerous nuclear situation playing out in Russia's military campaign against Ukraine.
When the clock was first put into motion in 1947, its original position was seven minutes to midnight. In 1953, during the Cold War as both the US and USSR tested their nuclear missiles, the clocks hands rose to just two minutes to midnight. However, the hands oscillated for some time amid the thawing and worsening of relations between the two powers.
The clock was furthest from Doomsday in 1991 as the Cold War officially ended and both the United States and Russia signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, which saw the hands stop at 17 minutes to midnight. At the time, the Bulletin declared: "The illusion that tens of thousands of nuclear weapons are a guarantor of national security has been stripped away".