The Doomsday Clock is a symbolic clock face, maintained
since 1947 by the board of directors of the Bulletin of
the Atomic Scientists at the University of
Chicago. The closer the clock is to midnight, the closer the world
is estimated to be to global disaster. The most recent officially announced
setting — five minutes to midnight (11:55pm) — was made on 10 January
2012. Reflecting international events dangerous to humankind, the clock's hands
have been adjusted twenty times since its inception in 1947, when the clock was
initially set to seven minutes to midnight (11:53pm).
Originally, the clock analogy represented the threat of global nuclear war;
however, since 2007 it has also reflected climate-changing
technologies and "new developments in the life sciences that could inflict
irrevocable harm."
Since its inception, the clock has been depicted on every
cover of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. Its first representation was in
1947, when magazine co-founder Hyman Goldsmith asked artist Martyl Langsdorf
(wife of Manhattan
Project research associate and Szilárd
petition signatory Alexander Langsdorf, Jr.) to design a cover for
the magazine's June 1947 issue.
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