New Year, New World

PERRYSCOPE
Perry Diaz

After the much ballyhooed “Doomsday” predicted in the Mayan calendar came and passed last December 21, 2012, many people believe that the end of the world as we knew it had indeed happened and that a new world has begun with a fresh lease on life.

Yes, 2013 would be a challenging year considering what the world went through during the first decade of the third millennium.  Natural calamities caused untold human suffering across the globe.  But the human spirit endured in the harshest conditions where the strongest amongst us carried the weakest on their backs.

And for as long as the Homo sapiens species is in existence, it will survive the wrath of Mother Nature.  But what it might not survive is the destructive power of man-made calamities.

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Under the terms of the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), there are five “nuclear-weapons states,” namely United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, and China.  They are sometimes referred to as the Nuclear Club.  But there are three other states that are not parties to the treaty but have conducted nuclear tests, namely, India, Pakistan, and North Korea.

Israel is believed to possess nuclear weapons but she refused to confirm or deny this.

Iran is suspected of developing a nuclear weapon and is believed to be within five years of achieving it.

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Leonard Reiser, chairman of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and member of the Manhattan Project adjusts the Doomsday Clock in 2010. (REUTERS)

With eight states possessing nuclear capability, the world is closer to midnight on the Doomsday Clock.

According to Wikipedia, “The Doomsday Clock is a symbolic clock face, maintained since 1947 by the board of directors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists at the University of Chicago.  The closer the clock is to midnight, the closer the world is estimated to be to global disaster [e.g., Nuclear or biological weapons, climate change, and other human-caused disasters]. The most recent officially announced setting — five minutes to midnight (11:55pm) – was made on January 10, 2012. Reflecting international events dangerous to humankind, the clock’s hands have been adjusted twenty times since its inception in 1947, when the clock was initially set to seven minutes to midnight (11:53pm).

“Originally, the clock analogy represented the threat of global nuclear war; however, since 2007 it has also reflected climate-changing  technologies and ‘new developments in the life sciences that could inflict irrevocable harm.’ ”

The closest the Doomsday Clock came to midnight was in January 1953 when it was moved to two minutes to midnight – 11:58pm – during the Korean War.  That year, the U.S. tested its first tactical nuclear weapon – a hydrogen bomb — and considered its use against military targets involved in the Korean War.  Had the U.S. used it against China who had entered the war on the side of North Korea, it would have triggered World War III.

The second closest to midnight was in February 1984 during the Lebanon crisis when the Doomsday Clock was moved to three minutes to midnight.

The third closest was in 2007 when the clock was moved to 11:55 pm, five minutes to midnight.   At that time North Korea conducted a nuclear weapon test and Iran showed signs of developing nuclear capabilities.  The U.S. reacted by considering the use of nuclear weapons in the event of war with these two “rogue” states.

In 2010, the clock was moved back to six minutes – 11:54pm — from midnight when world leaders seemed to have addressed global threats, particularly climate change.  The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAC) issued a statement saying that climate change threatens to bring droughts, famine, water scarcity and rising seas.

But on January 10, 2012, the BAC moved the Doomsday Clock one minute closer to midnight — 11:55 pm — not because of threats of nuclear war but in a “sign of pessimism about the future of humanity.”  The BAC issued a statement saying, “Two years ago, it appeared that world leaders might address the truly global threats that we face. In many cases, that trend has not continued or been reversed.” And in a stern warning it said, “The global community may be near a point of no return in efforts to prevent catastrophe from changes in Earth’s atmosphere.”  Indeed, 2012 was a year when all kinds of calamities – earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, nuclear reactor meltdown, tsunami tidal waves, floods, forest fires, deadly tropical storms, etc. — relentlessly hit Mother Earth.  Makes one wonder how much longer can she survive?

For the first time since its inception in 1947, the Doomsday Clock moved closer to midnight because of climate change, which is caused by human abuses to the environment including global warming.

The 2006 documentary film, “Inconvenient Truth,” showed the effects of global warming from a collection of facts and information presented by former Vice President Al Gore.  Director Davis Guggenheim said, “Al Gore strips his presentations of politics, laying out the facts for the audience to draw their own conclusions in a charming, funny and engaging style, and by the end has everyone on the edge of their seats, gripped by his haunting message.”

The following year, Gore and the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change won the Nobel Peace Prize.  At the awards presentation in Oslo, Norway in October 2007, Gore warned that global warming is “the greatest challenge we’ve ever faced.”  Indeed.

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On October 29, 2012, Superstorm Sandy made landfall on the coast of New Jersey and went on to wreak havoc in 15 states — the most populous region in the United States.  By the time Sandy left, more than $50 billion in property were destroyed or damaged, 4.5 million homes without power, and close to 100 people dead.

Sandy was the worst storm that hit the East Coast in recent history.  But what is important to note is that many people called Sandy a “Frankenstorm,” which was taken from “Frankenstein,” the man-made monster that was stitched together from various parts.  Like “Frankenstein,” Frankenstorm Sandy was “stitched” together from three different weather systems: Hurricane Sandy that came from the Caribbean; a western early winter storm; and a cold influx of Arctic wind from the north, creating a tropical “monster” of high winds, heavy rain, blistering snow, and high ocean tides.

Discounting what conspiracy theorists say as to what had created Frankenstorm Sandy, the one that stood out as believable and credible is climate change. Could a gradual increase in global climate temperature affect how various weather systems interact and create a hybrid monster storm like Sandy?

Unless global warming is addressed seriously and measures are developed and implemented to mitigate the catastrophic effects of climate change, the Doomsday Clock is ticking closer and closer to midnight.

We’ve survived the Mayan Doomsday prophecy; can we survive a Doomsday of our own creation?

Scientists say that the Sun has seven billion years of life left.  That’s a lot of time.  Let’s welcome the New Year  and resolve to create a New World that would survive till the end of time.(PerryDiaz@gmail.com)