Why we don't need to care about the Doomsday Clock

I noticed a thread about the Doomsday Clock was started last week. I'm not here much anymore, but that's a genuine annoyance of mine. I wrote a post about this in another thread last year that really deserves to be its own thread, and the thread from last week is pretty dead, so here it is:

In Watchmen the Doomsday clock was mentioned, followed by a great line by the alternate Richard Nixon:

"Who are these assholes to say when doomsday approaches? I say when doomsday is approaching!"

So just who are these assholes? Well, they're members of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists' Science and Security Board. And who are they? According to their website, "The Science and Security Board (SASB) is comprised of a select group of globally recognized leaders with a specific focus on nuclear risk, climate change and emerging technologies." Here they are. Note their credentials. They're on all kinds of impressive sounding boards that you would think indicate they're experts in international relations and strategic analysis. Are they?

The first two are unquestionably unqualified: former failed California governor Brown, the chairman, has zero qualifications. Next is a woman named Lynn Eden, whose entire career has been in academia with no real-world experience in, well, anything. Then we get to Mr. Rod Ewing.

Professor in Nuclear Security in the Center for International Security and Cooperation in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies

Sounds impressive, but what about some specifics?

Ewing’s research focuses on the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle, mainly nuclear materials and the geochemistry of radionuclides. He is the past president of the International Union of Materials Research Societies. Ewing has written extensively on issues related to nuclear waste management

Oh, so he's an expert in how to handle nuclear waste. How does that qualify him to judge how close we are to nuclear war or anything else that can bring about "doomsday?" He's also a Professor in the Department of Geological Sciences in the School of Earth, Environmental, and Energy Sciences at Stanford University. No help there. He has written about climate change though.

The next gentleman is Steve Fetter.

He is a fellow of the American Physical Society and a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists board of directors and the National Academy of Sciences Committee on International Security and Arms Control. He has worked on nuclear policy issues in the Pentagon and the State Department

I'll take that, we'll call him qualified.

Moving right along, Daniel Holz.

Holz is an Associate Professor in Physics, Astronomy & Astrophysics, the Enrico Fermi Institute, and the Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics, at the University of Chicago. His research focuses on general relativity in the context of astrophysics and cosmology.

So his qualifications on this subject are... none? Got it. But he's written about climate change. He doesn't appear to be qualified to write about that either, but that's a pretty common theme in the climate change arena anyway.

Next we've got Sivan Kartha.

Kartha is a Senior Scientist at the Stockholm Environmental Institute whose research and publications for the past 20 years have focused on technological options and policy strategies for addressing climate change, concentrating most recently on equity and efficiency in the design of an international climate regime.

Unqualified.

Elizabeth Kolbert:

Kolbert has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 1999 and has written extensively on science and climate change to great acclaim.

Unqualified.

Are we seeing a pattern here? The next few folks are a theoretical physicist, a cybersecurity expert (would be a good person to consult on certain security issues, by why are they on the actual board?), a physician. There's Steven Miller who actually appears to have some international security expertise. 2 more physicists, an astronomer. Jennifer Sims, who appears to have gotten her position because she was an Obama crony in Chicago. An environmentalist, an oceanographer.

Sharon Squassoni sounds qualified based on the positions she's held, but her education is in unrelated fields. Wonder how she got those positions (politics).

A retired Admiral, that sounds promising. What was his command history? Naval Meteorological and Oceanography Command and he was on the Navy's task force on climate change. I don't think you can become an admiral without going through at least some formal strategic training, so I'll be generous and give them that one.

The last guy, Jon Wolfsthal sounds qualified.

So out of 16 board members who manage this clock, only 4 or 5 of them have any realistic qualifications to be doing this kind of work, and if I'm generous you might bump it up to 7 or 8. That's maaaybe half the board. The rest of them are just there because of the recent effort to turn this into a climate change clock, and probably through some political cronyism. Almost all of them have been involved with climate change research.

The lesson here is don't pay any attention to this #in thing. It's meaningless. It always has been, but it's even more of a joke now.

NOTE: Not all the members are the same today. But most of the new members are every bit as unqualified as the folks they replaced, so the spirit of the post remains as true now as it was when I wrote it. Over half the board still has no real qualifications or practical experience in fields like strategic studies, international relations, or other things that would be necessary to do this kind of work.

With US & Russia having some 10K nukes,

1945 is bound to happen again, maybe 200M or B instead of 200k next 'time'

Bravissimo
You actually researched BEFORE you posted , unlike some that just read the "glorified headline" and run with it.

And your premise is correct.
What matters is SC DEFCON status.
Right now ?
It is at DEFCON 5 - Fade Out.

originally posted by: tulsi
With US & Russia having some 10K nukes,

1945 is bound to happen again, maybe 200M or B instead of 200k next 'time'

Your logic is flawed. You'd make a fine candidate to sit on the board with these people.

Awesome thread! Thank you for this info!! And I agree- it sounds like the Doomsday Clock is a crock.

originally posted by: tulsi
With US & Russia having some 10K nukes,

1945 is bound to happen again, maybe 200M or B instead of 200k next 'time'

What????

Denying ignorance.
Why ?
Sometimes I have only a short statement as it was so bad I did not know where to start.

This is really Phil Hendrie right......? we have your number, don't deny it....

lmao...good stuff there...I can relax now.

The board does have a pretty easy job and never have to prove their conclusions. If one day they should happen to be right there will be no one left to verify it. Just keeps a constant state of panic, OMG a few minutes to midnight, the sky is falling and we are all going to die.

a reply to: face23785

I"m sure you have dug a bit deeper here, and the agenda of the "group" seems quite clear. I suppose doomsday is doomsday, irrespective of whether it"s caused by war, or something else, but then why obfuscate the situation?


What i"m wondering, is who appoints these ppl? Who pays the bills?

Any insight OP (or anyone else)?

Strange how they base it on "failure to address "climate change" and "carbonization" now .
The climate was a changing long before the Doomsday Clock.

a reply to: Mach2

What i"m wondering, is who appoints these ppl?

I think , in present day , it is according to the same folks that produced those weird as hell Progressive Insurance's Motaur commercials

a reply to: face23785

co opting previous things - really REALLY pisses me off

if these people want a " doomsday thermometer " - they should design one - and call it err :

" teh doomsday thermometer "

0.15 degrees till we melt

the doomsday clock - as a metric of our nuclear war status - was an origionsal idea - that worked . is still valid

people that wish to sharpen our attentiveness to climate change - should design thier own " system "

leave our nuclear appocalypes warning alone

rant over

a reply to: face23785

You seem to have a degree in claiming unqualified.

Good read. Lots of fun facts.

Dont use clocks much. Good advice

originally posted by: kwakakev
If one day they should happen to be right there will be no one left to verify it.

This is a common misconception. Early on when understanding of thermonuclear weapons was low, scientists thought complete human extinction was almost certain if a full nuclear exchange happened. In the last few decades though, no serious scientist thinks that's likely. Anyone interested can read a bit about it here.

That's not to say it wouldn't be bad, but it won't end the human race. That's environmentalist/peacenik propaganda.

originally posted by: sunkuong
a reply to: face23785

You seem to have a degree in claiming unqualified.

Good read. Lots of fun facts.

Dont use clocks much. Good advice

Obviously that's my opinion. If your opinion is that they are qualified, please, explain why you feel that way. That's kind of the nature of discussion, which is what these boards are all about isn't it?

a reply to: face23785

if the clock counts 12 ...nothing els matters then… we are all gone...

You know what Jimmy Buffett sang: "It's gotta be 2 seconds to Doomsday somewhere."