WAR CLOCK BECOMES SYMBOL OF ONLINE HYSTERIA

The Atlantic’s online arm, TheAtlantic.com (go figure) initiated a project recently called the “Iran War Clock.”

It uses the “Doomsday Clock” concept introduced by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists in 1947 to “represent its view of how close humanity is at a given moment to complete ruin.” Apparently, in 1953 the clock was at 11:58 p.m. following underground thermonuclear tests by the U.S. and the Soviet Union within a nine month span. When the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in 1991, the clock rolled back to 11:43 a.m. (always a comfort). Of course, if the clock ever hit midnight, KA-BOOM, Armageddon/End of Days/the Apocalypse/Doomsday.

The Atlantic’s Iran War Clock was quickly renamed the Iran War Dial because there was fear that many people would get overly excited, pee themselves and as a block of humanity online, they might spread fear and loathing throughout the cyber world. “Betting markets like Intrade.com rely on the wisdom of crowds.” (Remind me to avoid Intrade.com because the “wisdom of crowds” sounds like a metaphor for “mob rule.”)

So, back to the Iran War Dial, which the good folks at The Atlantic created as “an evocative homage to…a cool symbol of Cold War-era humanistic vigilance.” The Iran War Dial ranges from 11:40 p.m. to midnight, “with each minute representing a 5 percent difference in the odds of either the U.S. or Israel attacking Iranian nuclear facilities sometime in the next year, as estimated in aggregate by our panel of 22 academics, journalists, and foreign-policy analysts with specialist knowledge of the region and issue.”

So why am I getting into all of this? Well, consider: The Iran War Clock Dial was simply a subjective method of viewing the high tensions and political strain among the U.S., Israel and Iran. (The Atlantic admitted that it could not possibly represent a scientific or objective analysis.) Instead, it became a barometer for hysterics and True Believers (idiots/morons) to measure whatever Doomsday bullshit lurks between their ears.

It speaks at once to the power of the Internet and the social connections it can spawn and to the utter stupidity of some people.

And, by the way, The Atlantic’s panel has “the odds of conflict at 42 percent, down six percentage points from last month.”