Members of The Bulletin Of The Atomic Scientists announced on Tuesday that they have left the symbolic doomsday clock set at 90 seconds to midnight, as it was last year, warning that the threat of nuclear war remains close to the backdrop of the war in Ukraine, but also of war in the Gaza Strip, to which the problem of global warming is added, Reuters reports.

Dr. Leonard Reaser turns the clock on the Apocalypse Photo: Carl Wagner / Zuma Press / Profimedia

The announcement, made in Washington, shows that the perceived threat level is as serious as last year. Members of the organization set a symbolic clock according to the “existential” risks for humanity that they identify: the nuclear threat, global warming, as well as technologies with disruptive potential, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and new biotechnologies, writes Agerpres.

“Conflict hotspots in various regions of the world threaten nuclear escalation, climate change is already causing death and destruction, and breakthrough technologies like AI and biological research are advancing faster than the safeguards designed for them can keep up.” This was reported to Reuters by Rachel Bronson, the executive director of the Chicago organization. She specified that maintaining the same parameters as last year does not mean that the world is going through a period of stability.

“A permanent end to the war in Ukraine seems distant, and the use of Russia’s nuclear arsenal in this conflict remains a serious possibility. Last year, Russia sent many alarming signals in this regard,” Bronson also said.

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The situation in the Gaza Strip is also worrying. “Israel’s actions as a nuclear power are clearly relevant to the Doomsday Clock debate. We are particularly concerned about the possibility of an escalation of conflict throughout the region that could lead to a full-scale war using conventional means that could involve several nuclear states or those close to becoming nuclear states,” Bronson said.

The symbolic clock of the Apocalypse was established in 1947 by specialists of the organization The Bulletin Of The Atomic Scientists, who worked on the famous Manhattan Project, during which the first atomic bomb was created in history. They chose this symbol to show how close all of humanity is to nuclear war. The clock was originally set to 23:53:00 and then moved forward or backward each year depending on the threats humanity faced.