In 1945 Albert Einstein, Robert Oppenheimer and University of Chicago scientists helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project.

They also created the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists and two years later created the Doomsday Clock to convey the threats of nuclear explosions to humanity and the planet.

Since then, every year, the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board, in consultation with its Board of Sponsors (including eight Nobel Laureates Nobel Laureates) resets the clock.

Essentially the resetting is like the countdown to zero for a nuclear launch.

The Foundation says the Clock has become a universally recognised indicator of the world’s vulnerability to global catastrophe caused by man-made technologies.

The latest clock setting is 85 seconds to midnight.

Currently the last major agreement (New START) limiting the numbers of strategic nuclear weapons deployed by the US and Russia is set to expire – ending nearly 60 years of effort to constrain nuclear competition between Russia and the US. The Security Board also highlights the Trump administration’s keenness to resume nuclear testing

Trump and the Australian Opposition are also combined in its denial of the threat of climate change.

The Bulletin’s report said “the array of adverse trends also dominated the climate change outlook in the past year. The level of carbon dioxide – the greenhouse gas most responsible for human-caused climate change – reached a new high, rising 150% of pre-industrial levels.”

Global average temperatures in 20924 were the highest in the 175 year of records and 2025 was similar.

Freshwater from melting glaciers and thermal expansion forced average sea levels to a record high. Weather became more erratic with deluges and droughts “hopscotching around the world”.

Peru, the Amazon, southern Africa and northwest Africa experienced droughts. In Europe there were at least 60,000 heat-related deaths and floods in the Congo River Basin displaced 350,000 people and record rainfall in southeast Brazil displaced over half a million.

“The national and international responses to the climate emergency went from wholly insufficient to profoundly disruptive. None of the three most recent UN climate summits emphasised phasing out fossil fuels or monitoring carbon dioxide emissions.

In the US the Trump administration declared war on renewable energy and climate policies gutting national efforts to limit climate change.

The report also highlighted troubling developments in the life sciences. “In December 2024 scientists from nine countries announced the recognition of a potential threat to all life on earth; the laboratory synthetises of so-called “mirror life’ which could plausibly spread throughout all eco systems, and eventually cause the widespread of death of humans, other animals and plants, potentially disrupting all life on earth. So far, however, the international community has not arrived at a plan to address this risk.”.

We are amazed at – or terrified by the spread of – AI. Boosters sing its praises, intellectual property holders despair, and researchers see AI as a different sort of biological threat – the potential for AI-aided design of new pathogens to which humans have no effective defences.

“Also, concerns about state sponsored biological weapons programs have deepened due to the weakening this year of international norms and mechanisms for productive engagement.”

Unlike the boosters pushing AI shares into mega- boom area the possibility of a crash is great with ongoing impacts on markets and the real economy.

The report’s concerns are, however,  wider than the stock market and weaponisation however.

“Perhaps of most immediate concern is the rapid degradation of US public health infrastructure and expertise. This dangerously reduces the ability of the US and other nations to respond to pandemic and other biological threats,” the report said.

To envisage how bad this could get just imagine for a minute such a pandemic when Robert F. Kennedy Jnr was the US Secretary for Health.

The reports core foundational principles were, however, not ignored.

It said: “As divisions between nuclear and non nuclear countries deepen amid rising geopolitical tensions, the outlook for the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty remains cloudy.

“With no progress on arms control, strategic competition among major powers is showing signs of becoming a full-blown arms race, as evidenced by rapidly increasing numbers of nuclear warheads and platforms in China; the US decision to begin the Golden Dome missile defence program; the continued modernization of nuclear delivery systems in the United States, Russia, and China; and new concerns about the possible resumption of nuclear testing.

“With each of those countries having leaders with nationalist and autocratic tendencies, nuclear issues are being framed around the importance of retaining strategic superiority

“In 2025, the world slipped closer to normalizing nuclear risks. There was an almost complete absence of communication on strategic stability among nuclear adversaries and no sustained pressure from non-nuclear weapons countries for engagement. Also worrying is a lack of leadership on nuclear issues, with no country stepping up to stem the growing sense of disorder and breakdown of norms.”

So – as the seconds tick away how much confidence do you have that Trump and Putin can manage the situation?

John Spitzer alerted the blog to the latest Bulletin of Atomic Scientists