http://www.thebulletin.org/
What is the Doomsday Clock? (see top right of screen) How close are we to midnight? Note how the clock has moved throughout history, especially during the height of the Cold War! What is the closest we have ever been to midnight? What are your perceptions re: the possibility of nuclear war, nuclear accidents, and/or an act of terror using nuclear devices?
The "Doomsday Clock" is an allegory, demonstrating in graphic terms how close the humankind is to a global nuclear catastrophy, or destruction. Currently we are 6 minutes to midnight, for the most part because of the accident in Japan, where all four reactors of the nuclear energy plant were damaged in an earthquake. Personally I think, it's a little bit exadurated by the media; according to the nuclear scientists the accident is not even level 4 (Three Mile Island was level 5, Chernobyl - level 7). I lived about 50 miles from Chernobyl, moved there less than a year after it blew-up. It was pretty well-contained by then, even with Russian famous idiocy and slowliness. Japan has far better trained personnel, better resourses and organization; I think they will take care of the problem. The closest we've ever been to midnight was in 1953, when Russia had an H-bomb, and the US didn't yet, therefore the balance was distorted.
ReplyDeleteHow close was the clock to midnight in 1953? Thanks for an insightful analysis of "the clock"!
ReplyDeleteWe were 2 minutes to midnight in 1953, according to the site. I personally think that we were closer than that in 1973, when the computer malfunction at NORAD almost triggered unprovoked American response to non-existent Russian attack, but who am I to say.
ReplyDeleteThanks for being willing to share your viewpoints from the "other side"!
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