Big day today folks. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists will move the hands on their famous “doomsday clock”.
Here’s my guess. Climate scientist Steven Schneider will be speaking. We know what he is all about. The Copenhagen Climate Conference failed in December and there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth. My prediction is that these alarmists will move the clock closer to midnight, citing the Copenhagen “failure” as pushing mankind closer to the brink of “climate disaster” or some such phrase.
Plus, we’ll get to watch them turn the hands of the clock live via webfeed. Such stunning visuals. Yawn. I’ll save you the suspense. In 2007 it was set to five minutes to midnight, to reflect the failure to solve problems posed by nuclear weapons. Today I’m guessing they’ll mention Copenhagen’s failure and list climate change as the next global threat and set it to 4 minutes to midnight. Or…maybe 3, if Steven Schneider scares them enough. UPDATE: my guess was wrong: they moved it back to 6 minutes see here
From the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists press release:
Hands of the “Doomsday Clock” to be moved in New York City and seen live on web for first time ever
8 January 2010
… News Advisory for January 14, 2010 …
Factors In Change to Include Nuclear Proliferation, Weapon Stockpile Shifts, and Climate Change; Bulletin of Atomic Scientists Will Open Event to World With Real-Time Streaming Web Broadcast.
NEW YORK CITY///NEWS ADVISORY///January 14, 2010///The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS) will move the minute hand of its famous “Doomsday Clock” at 10 a.m. EST/1500 GMT on January 14, 2010 in New York City. For the first time ever, the event will be opened up to the general public via a live Web feed at http://www.TurnBackTheClock.org.
The last time the Doomsday Clock minute hand moved was in January 2007, when the Clock’s minute hand was pushed forward by two minutes from seven to five minutes before midnight.
The precise time to be shown on the updated Doomsday Clock will not be announced until the live news conference in New York City takes place on January 14, 2010. Factors influencing the latest Doomsday Clock change include international negotiations on nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation, expansion of civilian nuclear power, the possibilities of nuclear terrorism, and climate change.
News event speakers will include:
- Lawrence Krauss, co-chair, BAS Board of Sponsors, foundation professor, School of Earth and Space Exploration and Physics departments, associate director, Beyond Center, co-director, Cosmology Initiative, and director, New Origins Initiative, Arizona State University.
- Stephen Schneider, member, BAS Science and Security Board, professor of environmental biology and global change, Stanford University, a co-director, Center for Environment Science and Policy of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and senior fellow, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment.
- Jayantha Dhanapala, member, BAS Board of Sponsors, president, Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, and chair, 1995 UN Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Conference;
- Pervez Hoodbhoy, member, BAS Board of Sponsors, professor of high energy physics, and head, Physics Department, Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan; and
- Kennette Benedict, executive director, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Founded in 1945 by University of Chicago scientists who had helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project, The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists subsequently created the Doomsday Clock in 1947 as way to convey both the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero). The decision to move the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock is made by the Bulletin’s Board of Directors in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which includes 19 Nobel Laureates. The Clock has become a universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to catastrophe from nuclear weapons, climate change, and emerging technologies in the life sciences.
TO PARTICIPATE IN PERSON: Attend the live news event on January 14, 2010 at 10 a.m. EST, at the New York Academy of Sciences Building, at 7 World Trade Center, 250 Greenwich St, 40th floor, New York City. The event will be limited to credentialed members of the news media. For security reasons, all attendees must RSVP in advance by contacting Patrick Mitchell, (703) 276-3266, or pmitchell@hastingsgroup.com.
CAN’T PARTICIPATE IN PERSON?: Reporters outside of New York City who are unable to attend the live news event in person can watch and listen to the news conference via a live Webcast by registering by 945 a.m. EST on January 14, 2010 at http://www.TurnBackTheClock.org/media. A streaming audio replay of the news event will be available on the Web at http://www.thebulletin.org as of 6 p.m. EST/2300 GMT on January 14, 2010.
The Mayan calendar does NOT predict any apocalypse. It simply ends. Period. I really can’t believe people think there is anything to this…
*yawns loudly*
… did somebody say something about a clock… ?
*smacks lips*
… I need a cup of coffee…
*rubs eyes*
*yawn*
… oh nevermind…
… back to sleep I go…
… wake me when it’s over
So CO2 has finally reached status of a WMD?
I am scared to death. How ridiculous this is.
Mod: Understand snip, last was too too.
_______________
This “Atomic Doomsday Clock” show has the same significance as the One and Only Groundhog Day celebration held in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. I think the folks in Pennsylvania have a far better and more entertaining farce.
My God, that doomsday presentation was the most boring live meeting I’ve sat through since my workplace threw a two hour seminar on the impact of Sarbanes-Oxley on our programming documentation standards.
If those “Atomic Scientists” were smart they would have invited the Governator in full T2 attire along with Nancy Pelosi (as Sarah Connor) to rave about SkyNet and the end of the world. Now that would have been stimulating!
Such doom and gloom…
Rejoice humankind, the hand of fate was actually moved 1 minute further away from the apocalypse, due to Obama being in the White House and being such a nice guy so people don’t hate us anymore (quite as much).
Except the Malthusians. They still hate us all.
The maddening search for plausible excuses to “intervene anthropogenically” to save the Climate from catastrophic warming moves the clock forward.
Progressively escalating the level of alarm has led to the proliferation of proposed ‘cures’ worse than the disease.
Think about it.
Environmentally destructive measures are tendered to save the planet.
Sucking out the C02 that is a building block of life.
Blowing volcanoes that can cause “nuclear winter” conditions and fallout.
Injecting S02 or sulphur compounds to block sunlight causes acid rain that fouls ecosystems.
Shutting down the modern energy system that is needed to adapt to colder climactic conditions.
This movement is building an eco-weapon and creating the paranoia to deploy/employ it.
EWMD=Eco Weapon of Mass Destruction
I’d always wondered what an atomic clock looked like. I have to say it’s something of a disappointment.
“And now,” cried Max from the centre of the stage, “the moment you’ve all been waiting for!” He flung his arms into the air. Behind him, the band went into a frenzy of percussion and rolling synthochords. Max had argued with them about this but they had claimed it was in their contract that that’s what they would do. His agent would have to sort it out.
“The skies begin to boil!” he cried. “Nature collapses into the screaming void! In twenty seconds’ time, the Universe itself will be at an end! See where the light of infinity bursts in upon us!”
The hideous fury of destruction blazed about them – and at that moment a still small trumpet sounded as from an infinite distance. Max’s eyes swiveled round to glare at the band. None of them seemed to be playing a trumpet. Suddenly a wisp of smoke was swirling and shimmering on the stage next to him. The trumpet was joined by more trumpets. Over five hundred times Max had done this show, and nothing like this had ever happened before. He drew back in alarm from the swirling smoke, and as he did so, a figure slowly materialized inside, the figure of an ancient man, bearded, robed and wreathed in light. In his eyes were stars and on his brow a golden crown.
“What’s this?” whispered Max, wild-eyed, “what’s happening?”
At the back of the Restaurant the stony-faced party from the Church of the Second Coming of the Great Prophet Zarquon leapt ecstatically to their feet chanting and crying.
Max blinked in amazement. He threw up his arms to the audience.
“A big hand please, ladies and gentlemen,” he hollered, “for the Great Prophet Zarquon! He has come! Zarquon has come again!”
Thunderous applause broke out as Max strode across the stage and handed his microphone to the Prophet.
Zarquon coughed. He peered round at the assembled gathering. The stars in his eyes blinked uneasily. He handled the microphone with confusion.
“Er …” he said, “hello. Er, look, I’m sorry I’m a bit late. I’ve had the most ghastly time, all sorts of things cropping up at the last moment.”
He seemed nervous of the expectant awed hush. He cleared his throat.
“Er, how are we for time?” he said, “have I just got a min-”
And so the Universe ended.
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/doomsday-clock-moves-one-minute-away-from-midnight-81498342.html
This is the link: “it’s hopeychangemas!!” for the UOSC….
The website http://www.green-agenda.com is up at the moment, and the second quote is from Prof. Schneider:
“We need to get some broad based support,
to capture the public’s imagination…
So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts…
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest.”
– Prof. Stephen Schneider,
Stanford Professor of Climatology,
lead author of many IPCC reports
But, to see the real political motivations, you have to scroll down about 40% to reach comments such as:
“The goal now is a socialist, redistributionist society,
which is nature’s proper steward and society’s only hope.”
– David Brower,
founder of Friends of the Earth
EcoChondria : Excessive Fear of the Climate. Leads to an inverted perception of climactic conditions where warming is bad and cooling is good. A powerful delusion wherein 20,000 years of instinct that tells us, from inherited experience, that the opposite is true, is overridden by hysterical imaginations.
Again .. the politics of fear
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
LOL, Janice! That’s been my favorite end-of-all-things story for a long time now!!!
Maybe Zarquon is Schneider’s future incarnation….
Jeff Alberts (07:58:32) :
The Mayan calendar does NOT predict any apocalypse. It simply ends. Period. I really can’t believe people think there is anything to this…
The Mayan calendar is cyclic. It doesn’t end, it just reaches the end of the long count and starts the next one. What is remarkable about the Mayan calendar is that it seems to be based on very long planetary motion cycles.
@ur momisugly tallbloke –
That Manns-Doom-clock of yours is a gem!
Nearly fell of my perch, laughing.
Those guys’s goal is the following:
To equalize the economies of rich and poor nations, he proposed that funds from nations with trade surpluses would be confiscated by an international bank (or clearing house) and transferred to poorer nations whose goods had been exported at low prices
http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/features/bringing-climate-change-global-governance
Surprise! I just read they moved it a minute back, to 6 min to midnight! Yeah, Iran about to go nuclear, that’s an encouraging sign! But on the other hand, so much progress was made at COP15!
‘……The decision by the BAS Science and Security Board was made in consultation with the Bulletin’s Board of Sponsors, which includes 19 Nobel Laureates…..because…..’……industrialized and developing countries alike are pledging to limit climate-changing gas emissions that could render our planet nearly uninhabitable…….’
Are these Muppets (sorry, Nobel Laureates) completely unaware of Climategate……or is that the REAL reason they have moved the clock back?
Now, we know, thanks to “Climate Gate”, that beginning in 1945 their profound preocupation was really another: Global Governance. Now they propose a II Brenton Woods, etc,etc.
Interesting times we are living in, when mud idols tumble down, science “gods” knowingly or naively conspiring to control world finances.
” Logan (08:16:22) :
“The goal now is a socialist, redistributionist society,
which is nature’s proper steward and society’s only hope.”
– David Brower,
founder of Friends of the Earth”
”
I love this one. Remembering the pollution caused by the GDR’s lignite power plants and their stinking two-stroke motors (Trabant). Yeah, socialism will help… sure. Help you to an early grave.
JonesII (08:30:21) :
“Those guys’s goal is the following:
‘To equalize the economies of rich and poor nations,..'”
_________________
Purity is a rare phenomena in nature and in people. Science for the sake of science is a very expensive endeavor. Patrons with ulterior motives are required to make any progress in the arts or the sciences. The artist and the scientist are merely the human means to the political and/or financial ends. There is more of the political and financial in AGW than the scientific.
The whole thing is incredibly stupid.
It’s not as if they are up on any of the strategy, tactics, history, politics, or any of that boring old stuff.
I remember the mass die-ins in 1984 over the Euromissile crisis. It was 4 minutes until midnight then. (It’s not as if one in a hundred people who even heard about that actually understood even the most basic issues involved.)
Mayan Stonecarver to Mayan astrologer: “Hey, I got to 2012 and I ran outta room on this thing.”
Mayan astrologer: “Well, that’s gonna freak some people out in a few centuries.”