The Board of Directors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has just moved the minute hand of the "Doomsday Clock," their symbol of nuclear danger, from seven to five minutes to midnight. The clock debuted fifty-nine years ago, set to seven minutes to midnight. Since the end of the Cold War in 1991, this is the fourth time the hand has moved forward. (See Reference Library entries: It is 5 Minutes to Midnight and “DOOMSDAY CLOCK” Moves Two Minutes Closer to Midnight)
Since 1949, the hands on this clock have moved nineteen times. In 1953 the Bulletin set the clock at two minutes to midnight, and in 1991, with the collapse of the Soviet Union, they backed the clock to seventeen minutes before midnight. Since then it has moved closer three times, to its present position of five minutes before midnight.
The position of the "Doomsday Clock" has always been big news. Its movement never fails to capture the public's imagination, especially when it is toward rather than away from midnight. After all, newsmakers and reporters and public leaders reason, "Atomic scientists surely know whereof they speak."
Right?
Well, probably – if it were actually atomic scientists doing the speaking, and if they were speaking about atomic weapons, about which they probably know a great deal.
So who are these folks alarming the world while posing as "atomic scientists"?
For starters, their real name is the Educational Foundation for Nuclear Science (EFNS), formed in Chicago in 1949 as a nonprofit organization. They are currently sponsored by – read, "these are people who allow their names to appear on their letterhead" – a group of thirty-nine eminent men of science and letters, including twelve Nobel laureates. They also list twenty-six deceased scientists and academics, including another fourteen Nobel laureates.
This is pretty impressive, so long as you don't probe beneath the surface to discover who actually decides Bulletin editorial policy, the EFNS organizational point of view, and the all-important Doomsday Clock position. The governing board consists of fifteen people, nearly all from well-known intellectual groups holding political points of view ranging from the left to the far left. A partial listing includes the Union of Concerned Scientists, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Program on Global Security and Disarmament, Institute for International Peace Studies, and Peace Research Institute Frankfurt.
These folks have a clear, well-defined agenda, one that – more often than not – is opposed to the official position of the U.S. government and – more importantly – represents an outlook inherently bad for us, the citizens of the United States.
And now, to top off their agenda-driven announcement, they state that one of their primary reasons for advancing the clock this time is Climate Change, which they view as an even greater danger than nuclear annihilation.
Hiding behind the guise of "atomic scientists," these hard-core members of the intellectual left inject fear and panic into the social context every time they move their ominous clock nearer midnight.