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SadMacaroon9897 t1_j5zrnjg wrote

Reply to comment by Bioshutt in doomsday clock real or fake? by Ludwik2006

The difference though is that it largely makes no difference if they say 60 seconds to midnight or 1 hour to midnight: The state of the world does not depend on the clock. DEFCON in contrast directly impacts the state of the world...because it causes a change in the world (US military readiness).

In addition, the organization behind the Doomsday Clock has an incentive to be provocative and get into the news and drive fundraising.

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LockeClone t1_j5zsc5j wrote

They're competing agendas though. DEFCON is meant to inform institutions about which procedures and attitudes should be adopted and it's USA-centric.

The clock is meant to generally inform laymen what a board thinks is going on in the world that might potentially cause horrible events to occur. It's an easy way to contextualize world events for people who aren't experts... Which is almost surely everyone on this thread, myself included.

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Mayor__Defacto t1_j62jl8t wrote

DEFCON informs what posture the US Military (and thus, any other institution globally that cares what the US Military is doing) is taking. It has very tangible effects on US Military personnel and how quickly they are expected to respond, and the storage state of various assets. For example, at DEFCON 3, you would expect the USAF to essentially have weapons staged at all times to be fitted to aircraft; maintenance crews ready around the clock, and so on.

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dillrepair t1_j607w5h wrote

So we are at Defcon 3 right per the indicators used in osint right now in case anyone wants to know.

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