How close are we to Armageddon?

Feb 10

*A special thanks to Thalia Serino, AP US Government and Politics teacher extraordinaire at the world-famous Floyd E. Kellam High School - Go Knights!!!! - in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Whoot! Thanks so much for your dedication to your students and for sharing the fabulous infographic that is the basis of today’s lesson. Thank you Thalia!

Critical Analysis

Find answers to the following questions using the visual above, any links below, your big brain, and your knowledge of American government and politics:

According to the data in the visual above from the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, currently how close are we to the end of humanity at midnight (extinction/doomsday/Armageddon)?
According to the visual above, since the doomsday clock began tracking, what is the furthest we have been Armageddon?
The Doomsday Clock was created in 1947 by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which was founded two years earlier by scientists Albert Einstein, J Robert Oppenheimer and Eugene Rabinowitch along with University of Chicago scholars. During that time, the clock was set at seven minutes to midnight. But after the Soviet Union successfully tested its first atomic bomb in 1949, Rabinowitch, who was then the bulletin’s editor, moved the clock to three minutes to midnight. According to the University of Chicago, until recently, the closest it had ever been set was at two minutes to midnight: in 1953 when the US and the Soviet Union tested thermonuclear weapons and in 2018 because of “a breakdown in the international order, of nuclear actors, as well as the continuing lack of action on climate change”. According to the visual above, since the doomsday clock began tracking, what is the closest we have been Armageddon?
Why do you think humankind has been moving closer and closer to extinction since 1947?
In setting the Clock four seconds closer to midnight, the Science and Security Board sends a stark signal: Because the world is already perilously close to the precipice, a move of even a single second should be taken as an indication of extreme danger and an unmistakable warning that every second of delay in reversing course increases the probability of global disaster. What do you think the government of the United States should do to try to mitigate the risk of human extinction?
The Doomsday Clock is a design that warns the public about how close we are to destroying our world with dangerous technologies of our own making. It is a metaphor, a reminder of the perils we must address if we are to survive on the planet. When the Doomsday Clock was created in 1947, the greatest danger to humanity came from nuclear weapons, in particular from the prospect that the United States and the Soviet Union were headed for a nuclear arms race. The Bulletin considered possible catastrophic disruptions from climate change in its hand-setting deliberations for the first time in 2007. There are now four areas that the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists are most concerned about when deciding on the time of the doomsday clock and our proximity to extinction. 1)Nuclear risk. 2)Climate Change. 3)Biological Threats. 4)Disruptive Technologies. Explain which of these four threats you think is most dangerous to humankind.
According to the data from the visual below*, the number of nuclear weapons in the world has dropped dramatically since about 1989.* The New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), the last binding treaty limiting U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals, was signed on July 31, 1991 and officially expired on February 5, 2026. Its expiration ends over 50 years of bilateral arms control, removing constraints on strategic nuclear weapons and eliminating inspection regimes. This creates an unconstrained environment for nuclear expansion amid rising global tensions. How will this impact the Doomsday clock?
If you were a member of the U.S. government would you want to restart START?
Describe some of the most important members of the United States government (in any branch of government, but particularly in the executive branch) who are most responsible for America’s security.
One year of the Trump presidency moved the doomsday clock four seconds closer to Armageddon. How do you think the next year of the Trump presidency will impact the setting of the clock one year from now?