Who Keeps Winding the Doomsday Clock?

“Uh oh,” said several Manhattan Project scientists after they helped build a bomb and then it got used. They jumped to stop it from ever being used again. Solution: a newsletter. Through a somewhat convoluted chain of events that spawned the most famous symbol of humanity’s dance with extinction: the Doomsday Clock.

Alex Bell, the CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which sets the Clock, tells its strange origin story and describes why the hands now sit closer than ever toward midnight — as well as what “midnight” actually means.

Guest:

Alexandra Bell, president and CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

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