Chicago, Illinois - The Doomsday Clock, which represents how near humanity is to catastrophe, moved closer than ever to midnight as fears over nuclear weapons, climate change, and war grow.
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which set up the metaphorical clock at the start of the Cold War, on Tuesday moved its time to 85 seconds to midnight – four seconds closer than a year ago.
The announcement comes a year into President Donald Trump's second term, during which he has shattered what was left of global norms by ordering unilateral military attacks and withdrawing from a slew of international organizations.
The US, along with Russia, China, and other major countries have "become increasingly aggressive, adversarial, and nationalistic," said a statement announcing the clock shift, determined after consultations with a board that includes eight Nobel laureates.
"Hard-won global understandings are collapsing, accelerating a winner-takes-all great power competition and undermining the international cooperation critical to reducing the risks of nuclear war, climate change, the misuse of biotechnology, the potential threat of artificial intelligence, and other apocalyptic dangers."
The Doomsday Clock board warned of heightened risks of a nuclear arms race, with the New START nuclear arms reduction treaty between the US and Russia set to expire next week and Trump pushing a "Golden Dome" missile defense system that would further militarize space.
It also noted the record emission levels of carbon dioxide, the key driver of the planet's warming temperatures, after Trump sharply reversed US policy on fighting climate change.
Board members warned of a fracturing of global trust.
"We are living through an information Armageddon – the crisis beneath all crises – driven by extractive and predatory technology that spreads lies faster than facts and profits from our division," said Maria Ressa, the Filipina investigative journalist and Nobel Peace Prize winner.
The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, founded by Albert Einstein, Robert Oppenheimer and other nuclear scientists at the University of Chicago, initially placed the clock at seven minutes to midnight in 1947.