Lithp, you say it's disingenuous to call it fear mongering. Ok. I'll play along. But it is still called a Doomsday Clock, right? But hey, what's in a name, right? So we'll move on from that rather silly point. It's used to make us aware of how our actions along with natural forces push us towards and away from the precipice of our survival as a species. And they science the hell out of observable data, make models, study them to hell and back. Cool. That's what our scientists should be doing. Then, based on all of the peer reviewed data, they push the minute hand closer or further away as needed. Then someone calls the Washington Post or whoever and announces it, most likely through a press release. That's my summed up understanding from the Wiki article.
The work the Doomsday Clock people do is important. And I do not in the slightest mean to take away from that. As I said earlier, these are the things that should be studied. But the clock counting down to midnight? Really? That rings waaay too much of fire and brimstone. "The end is nigh" and "It's five minutes to midnight for our species" sound eerily similar. Our side is that of Truth and Beauty, theirs is more for revisionist history and a warped morality. Our side uses facts and established peer reviewed processes while theirs is more into myths, strawmen, and shifting goalposts. But the methods are the same. Proclaim a violent painful death unless we change our ways.
But we are the side for truth and beauty. So I'll concede. The Doomsday Clock can be the whatever the happy euphemism for fear mongering is.
