2021 Doomsday Clock Looks Eerily Similar to 2020, Scientists Say

Are we closer to the end than we might assume?

According to the Doomsday Clock the world remains approximately "100 seconds" from disaster.

Not exactly doomed, but pretty close, according to reports

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a nonprofit organization and publication whose symbolic Doomsday Clock has been estimating how close the world is to apocalypse since 1947, share their findings once a year, according to The New York Times.

The hands of its clock offers a real life measure of the "world’s vulnerability to catastrophe.” Or, in simpler terms, how close the world is to its own destruction at any given time.

This year, leading scientists cite the coronavirus pandemic, nuclear warfare, climate change and existential threats to humanity, Newsweek reported.

In 2020, the bulletin cited heightened tensions and worsening communication between the United States and other countries, including Russia and Iran. 

“The collective wisdom of our group is that it’s a wildly dangerous time with some incredibly important bright spots,” Rachel Bronson, the executive director and publisher of the bulletin, said on Wednesday during the group’s virtual event. 

Bronson pointed out that the clock has been inching towards midnight since 2018. At that time, the clock was set at two minutes to 12. The last time it was that close, she pointed out was in 1953, after the United States and the Soviet Union tested their first thermonuclear weapons, the Times said. 

"Next year, as always, we hope to move the hands of the Doomsday Clock away from midnight,” Bronson told the Times. 

Twice a year, the bulletin's Science and Security Board, comprised of nuclear and climate experts and other scientists, discuss how world events should dictate where the clock’s hands will fall. Much of their discussion is if humanity is safer or at greater risk than it was at the same time last year or compared with 75 years ago, Bronson said.

They do this with a unified goal of always, "hoping to move the hands of the Doomsday Clock away from midnight,” Bronson told the Times. 

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