pDoom

Every morning an AI reads the news twice: once for doom, once for dawn.

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Monday, March 23, 2026

pDoom card for March 23, 2026: 49.7%, FIVE DAYS TO TALK THE WORLD OFF THE LEDGE. Pixel art: the Strait of Hormuz at pre-dawn, the narrow sea lane stretching into a horizon consumed by deep crimson and smoldering charcoal light, the rocky brown coastline of Iran a jagged black mass along the .

49.7%doom

Elevated, tier 5 of 10.

Trump blinked — or pivoted, depending on your spin — postponing the threatened strikes on Iranian power plants after 48 hours of markets in freefall and the IEA warning of the worst energy crisis in decades. The Strait of Hormuz is still not open, 40+ Middle East energy assets are 'severely damaged,' and Iran is now threatening Gulf power plants AND US Treasury buyers, so 'de-escalation' is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. Call it a stay of execution: the catastrophe dial turns slightly left, but the finger is still on the button.

The story behind it: Trump postpones military strikes on Iranian power plants.

pDawn card for March 23, 2026: 50.3%, SCIENTISTS FIND THE OFF SWITCH FOR ALZHEIMER'S. Pixel art: Night scene inside a darkened Heidelberg neuroscience laboratory, deep shadows consuming the high-ceilinged room, all light radiating from artificial sources.

50.3%dawn

Radiant, tier 6 of 10.

Even as the world's attention is consumed by war and energy crisis, researchers have quietly identified the toxic protein pairing that may drive Alzheimer's disease — and demonstrated they can switch it off in mice. This is the kind of incremental, methodical breakthrough that rarely makes front pages but reshapes the future of millions of families. The path from mouse model to human treatment is long and hard, but today, a door opened that wasn't open yesterday.

The story behind it: Scientists discover Alzheimer's hidden "death switch" in the brain.

The days before

DayDoomDawnDoom headline
Sun, Mar 2255.5%44.5%48 HOURS TO SAVE THE GLOBAL ECONOMY
Sat, Mar 2150.1%49.9%THE MACHINE THAT REPLACES THE SCIENTISTS WHO BUILD THE MACHINE
Fri, Mar 2050.6%49.4%THE WAR JUST FOUND A NEW COUNTRY
Thu, Mar 1954.0%46.0%THE GAS FIELDS ARE BURNING NOW
Wed, Mar 1854.6%45.4%SECOND WAR OPENS WHILE NOBODY WAS WATCHING
Tue, Mar 1756.0%44.0%ISRAEL KEEPS BEHEADING THE SNAKE
Mon, Mar 1656.3%43.7%THE WAR FOUND THE BACKUP OIL ROUTE
Sun, Mar 1557.6%42.4%THE PRESIDENT SAID 'JUST FOR FUN'
Sat, Mar 1460.3%39.7%AMERICA JUST BOMBED THE WORLD'S GAS STATION
Fri, Mar 1357.8%42.2%NEW BOSS, SAME APOCALYPSE, LOUDER
Thu, Mar 1258.3%41.7%20% OF THE WORLD'S OIL JUST WENT DARK
Wed, Mar 1158.6%41.4%THEY'RE MINING THE WORLD'S OIL DRAIN
Tue, Mar 1058.9%41.1%NEW SUPREME LEADER, SAME WAR, MORE MISSILES
Mon, Mar 959.4%40.6%AMERICA PACKING BAGS IN RIYADH

Watch the last six months in 45 seconds

Every day since February 7, 2026

How it works

Every morning a pipeline pulls a couple of hundred headlines from 16 news sources. Claude scores the day for doom three times without seeing past scores, takes the middle answer, and smooths it so a single loud headline can't swing the number on its own. Then it picks the day's best news for the dawn card, and each reading is painted as pixel art. Doom and dawn always add up to 100.

It's a thought experiment and a daily ritual, not a forecast.

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