Langsdorf chose a clock to reflect the urgency of the problem: like a countdown, the Clock suggests that destruction will naturally occur unless someone takes action to stop it. The Bulletin 's Clock is not a gauge to register the ups and downs of the international power struggle it is intended to reflect basic changes in the level of continuous danger in which mankind lives in the nuclear age. As Eugene Rabinowitch, another co-founder of the Bulletin, explained later: The Clock was first represented in 1947, when the Bulletin 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.

After the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they began publishing a mimeographed newsletter and then the magazine, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which, since its inception, has depicted the Clock on every cover. The Doomsday Clock's origin can be traced to the international group of researchers called the Chicago Atomic Scientists, who had participated in the Manhattan Project. History Cover of the 1947 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists issue, featuring the Doomsday Clock at 'seven minutes to midnight' Since 2010, the clock has been moved forward four minutes and thirty seconds, and has changed by five minutes and thirty seconds since 1947. In January 2023, it was moved forward to 90 seconds (1 minute, 30 seconds) before midnight. The clock's setting was left unchanged in 20. In January 2020, it was moved forward to 100 seconds (1 minute, 40 seconds) before midnight. The clock was moved to two and a half minutes in 2017, then forward to two minutes to midnight in January 2018, and left unchanged in 2019. The farthest time from midnight was 17 minutes in 1991, and the nearest is 90 seconds, set on January 24, 2023. It has since been set backward eight times and forward 17 times for a total of 25. The clock's original setting in 1947 was seven minutes to midnight. The Bulletin 's Science and Security Board monitors new developments in the life sciences and technology that could inflict irrevocable harm to humanity. The main factors influencing the clock are nuclear risk and climate change. A hypothetical global catastrophe is represented by midnight on the clock, with the Bulletin 's opinion on how close the world is to one represented by a certain number of minutes or seconds to midnight, assessed in January of each year. Maintained since 1947, the clock is a metaphor for threats to humanity from unchecked scientific and technological advances. The Doomsday Clock is a symbol that represents the likelihood of a human-made global catastrophe, in the opinion of the members of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. The Doomsday Clock pictured at its 2023 setting of '90 seconds to midnight' For other uses, see Minutes to Midnight (disambiguation).

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