Tick, Tick, Doom

A physical, interactive reinterpretation of the Doomsday Clock that translates human decisions into real-time, tangible consequences.
Creative Technology, Interaction Design
2025
Acrylic, embedded electronics, kinetic mechanisms



Concept


The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ Doomsday Clock is a symbolic timepiece that represents humanity’s proximity to global catastrophe, measured in minutes (and now seconds) to midnight. Updated annually, it reflects existential risks such as nuclear threat, climate change, and emerging technologies. As of 2025, the clock stands at 89 seconds to midnight - the closest it has ever been.

This project translates the abstract, policy-driven logic of the Doomsday Clock into a tangible, interactive system. It reinterprets global risk as a series of individual, real-time decisions-framing collapse not as a distant event, but as the cumulative outcome of everyday choices.




System & Interaction


The device operates as a time-bound decision interface, where participants are given 89 seconds to navigate ethically ambiguous scenarios. Each response updates the system state in real time, shifting its proximity to “midnight.”

Interaction is structured through a combination of input, feedback, and physical actuation:
  • A joystick for navigating and selecting responses
  • An OLED display presenting prompts and system states
  • Four servo-driven “risk sliders” that continuously recalibrate

The scenarios/questions are designed as ‘wicked problems’, paradoxical situations with no correct answer, where each decision carries unintended consequences. Rather than guiding users toward an optimal outcome, the system exposes trade-offs, where progress in one domain may destabilize another.


The system is built on a custom risk model, developed through an analysis of historical Doomsday Clock reports and publications. This process identified recurring patterns and consistently emphasized areas of concern over time.

From this, four core dimensions were defined:
Nuclear Risk, Climate Risk, Technological Innovation, and Social Stability: a simplified but representative framework of the interconnected systems shaping global risk.




Takeaway

At the end of each session, the system generates a thermal-printed receipt that documents the user’s decision pathway and its resulting global state.

This receipt functions as a physical trace of interaction, a personalized record of consequence that extends the experience beyond the device. Rather than offering resolution, it leaves the participant with a constructed “future”, emphasizing that outcomes are not fixed, but continuously shaped through choice.