True Weird Stuff is currently on hiatus,

but Sherry and Max will be back with a brand new episode next week.

Until then, we present to you another one of their award-winning episodes.

Winner of Two Signal Awards for Best History Episode and Best Editing,

Doomsday Clock explores the origins of the clock and its lingering flirtation with striking midnight.

The doomsday clock is ticking closer to catastrophe,

illustrating the rising risks of self-annihilation.

It is now 89 seconds to midnight.

The symbolic clock has been reset and is now closer to midnight than ever before.

Atomic scientists cite nuclear threats and the climate crisis as two main factors underlying the risk of the end of the world.

The rapid progression of AI and record-breaking surface temperatures last year also contributed to scientist's decision.

Ongoing conflicts, including the Russia-Ukraine war, escalations in the war in the Middle East, Sudan and Syria,

have all impacted scientists' calculations.

The symbolic clock has been used by scientists

since the Cold War as a warning to world leaders and the public. Scary stuff. But if it's any

comfort, humans have been predicting the end of the world for about as long as there have been

humans, in part because we're very, very small,

but we think of ourselves as very, very important.

So, of course, that kind of main character energy is bound to leak all over everything.

We do love to put ourselves at the center of every story.

The ancient Assyrians were wringing their hands over the coming apocalypse more than

2,800 years ago. They even etched their worries into a stone tablet that somehow survived

...