Our Daily Bread

In 1947, scientists created the Doomsday Clock to symbolically show how close they believe the world is to a nuclear holocaust. In 1953, after the US tested a hydrogen bomb, the hands were set at 2 minutes before midnight. Since then they have been pushed back and forth 13 times. The clock’s safest setting was in 1991, after the US and Russia signed an arms-reduction treaty. The time was then set at 17 minutes before midnight. But in May 1999, after India and Pakistan set off nuclear blasts, the hands were advanced to 11:51.