Today, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved the hands of the "Doomsday Clock" closer to midnight -- and catastrophe -- than they have ever been in more than 70 years since the clock began to be used as a symbol of global danger. A combination of global unrest and political turmoil among nuclear powers, climate change, and cyber-warfare and disinformation, has brought the clock to 100 seconds from midnight, the first time it has broken the two-minute mark.
Reilly Center advisory board chair and adjunct professor, retired Major-General Robert Latiff, is a member of the Bulletin's science and security board. He spoke today at the meeting in Washington, D. C., where the announcement was made. He discussed the rise of information warfare and disinformation campaigns, AI weapons systems, and highly maneuverable hypersonic weapons, and the growing possibility of conflict in space -- "a witch's brew of ingredients for global conflict." The meeting has been widely reported in the domestic and international media, such as in the Washington Post.
For several years, Bob has taught a very popular course in the Reilly Center's Science, Technology, and Value (STV) program, on the "Ethics of Emerging Weapons Technologies." This course, which fulfills Notre Dame's second Philosophy requirement, will be offered again next Fall. He is the author of the book Future War: Preparing for the New Global Battlefield, and is currently a Fellow at the Notre Dame Institute for Advanced Study, where he is writing a book entitled Future Peace: Resisting War in a Networked World.