Doomsday Clock is now 100 seconds from midnight (An environment of misery)
Doomsday Clock is now 100 seconds from midnight
Space.com
By Mindy Weisberger 1/25/20
The hypothetical clock measures our nearness to Armageddon.
... When the Doomsday Clock was introduced in 1947, the primary threat to humanity was nuclear weapons. That threat still exists today, but it has company: catastrophic climate change and disruptive technologies are also considered by BAS in their assessment of whether humanity is safer or more at risk than we were the year before.
In 2019, nuclear and climate conditions continued to deteriorate, and decisions by global leaders not only failed to reduce the damage — they made dangerous situations worse... "Over the last two years, we have seen influential leaders denigrate and discard the most effective methods for addressing complex threats," Bronson said. Prior nuclear treaties are crumbling, new agreements between the U.S. and Russia are no closer than they were a year ago, and negotiations between the U.S. and North Korea regarding nuclear weapons reduction have been abandoned, according to Bronson.
Disruptive technologies
The development of artificial intelligence (AI) for use in weapons "that make kill decisions," and its use in military control and command systems is another new cause for concern...Even space has become "a new arena for weapons development" ... Equally troubling is the growing deluge of "fake news" (and its support by prominent politicians) and the rise of "deepfake" footage — digitally manipulated video that is increasingly difficult to distinguish from the real thing.
Heat waves, ice loss, fire
Globally, the year was the second hottest since record keeping began in 1880, and the past decade was the warmest on record, NASA reported earlier this month...Ocean temperatures are warmer than they've been at any point in human history, and they're heating up at an accelerating rate. The world's thickest mountain glacier is retreating, the Sahara Desert expanded by about 10%, and the Arctic's most stable sea ice is disappearing..."It will be an environment of misery in the case of slow-moving apocalypses such as climate change, it’s difficult for humans to envision the scale of the problem and to imagine how we will actually experience it”..
More here
https://www.space.com/doomsday-clock-update-2020.html