Doomsday Clock moved forward 2 minutes, sits only 3 minutes from midnight
By RYAN GORMAN
Humans are inching closer to a doomsday scenario, experts believe.
The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (BAS) moved the infamous Doomsday Clock ahead two minutes, leaving it three minutes from midnight.
Citing global warming and increasingly dangerous weapons caches around the world, BAS leaders claimed in a Thursday press conference that the "probability of global catastrophe is very high."
"In 2015, unchecked climate change, global nuclear weapons modernizations, and outsized nuclear weapons arsenals pose extraordinary and undeniable threats to the continued existence of humanity," the group said in a statement.
"World leaders have failed to act with the speed or on the scale required to protect citizens from potential catastrophe. These failures of political leadership endanger every person on Earth."
Earth's warmest recorded year was 2014, according to NOAA, and 14 of the 15 warmest years have occurred since 2000.
The remarkable warming led the U.S. to vote overwhelmingly across party lines this week (98-1) in agreement that climate change is real –- a marked shift from Republicans claiming the theory is a hoax.
Increasing tensions between Islamic extremists and the West, as well as chilling relations between the U.S. and Cold War enemies Russia and China were also cited.
The last time BAS moved the Doomsday Clock was in January 2012, according to the statement, when it was moved ahead one minute to five minutes to midnight.
"Since its creation in 1947, the Doomsday Clock has been adjusted only 18 times, ranging from two minutes before midnight in 1953 to 17 minutes before midnight in 1991," said BAS.
The Doomsday Clock's most recent move this close to the end was three minutes to midnight in 1983, "when U.S.-Soviet relations were at their iciest," BAS explained.
More than a dozen Nobel laureates sit on the board that decides where the doomsday clock should sit.
Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.
