The Doomsday Clock

Someday there may be nobody left to lead. Consider the Doomsday Clock, which tries to measure how close we are to the end of human civilization. Discuss with your team: how accurate do you think it is, and in what ways, if any, is it a helpful tool?

Ninety seconds to midnight. That is the time humanity was given in 2023 — the closest the hands have ever pointed, on a clock whose 'midnight' is the end of civilization.

Key concepts

Existential Risk: A threat that could end human civilization itself, not merely cause a disaster — originally nuclear war, now also climate breakdown, engineered pandemics, and advanced AI. The category matters because such risks can't be learned from by trial and error: there is no second try.

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What to know

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How accurate is the clock? It isn't — and accuracy was never its job. Its 'time' distills expert opinion into one dramatic image, built to be FELT, not read like a thermometer; asking whether 'ninety seconds' is literally true mistakes a communication device for a forecast.

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Across subjects

History puts the clock in old company: societies have long invented rituals to face collective death — medieval towns rang bells against the plague, Cold War

Theme connection

"Are We There Yet?"

Is a single dramatic number the right way to carry a warning this large? One side says only a gut-level image cuts through — a risk report no one reads saves no one. The other says one melodramatic figure crowds out the patient, specific action survival actually needs.

Practice — a sample

HISA 1947 clock built to warn the world of nuclear doom is MOST likely to have been founded by veterans of —

A The Manhattan Project
B The Human Genome Project
C The Apollo Program
D The Marshall Plan
E The Manhattan Transfer

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