Saturday, May 16, 2026
36.0%doom
Storm Brewing, tier 4 of 10.
A rare strain of Ebola — Bundibugyo, not the more familiar Zaire — has killed up to 80 people in DRC's Ituri province and is now confirmed in Uganda, meaning it's already jumped an international border. The fact that the US CDC only heard about this yesterday, weeks into a 246-case outbreak, is the kind of institutional lag that makes epidemiologists drink. Meanwhile, Trump and Xi wrapped up a 'very successful' summit with few concrete deals, Putin is immediately flying in to keep Xi's schedule full, and Iran signals it's open to talks while Trump says he's 'losing patience' — so the geopolitical pressure cooker is simmering but not yet boiling over.
The story behind it: New outbreak of Ebola kills 80 in eastern DR Congo.
64.0%dawn
Golden Hour, tier 7 of 10.
In a world rattled by missile tests, Ebola outbreaks, and geopolitical standoffs, a quiet but significant environmental milestone emerged: a real-world pilot project testing olivine-based ocean CO2 removal found zero harmful effects on marine life. That's not a small thing — it means one of the most promising and scalable carbon removal strategies just passed its first serious ecological safety check. Science, done carefully and honestly, keeps handing us tools to fix what we've broken.
The story behind it: First test of CO2 removal with green sand finds no harm to marine life.
The days before
| Day | Doom | Dawn | Doom headline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fri, May 15 | 38.4% | 61.6% | HORMUZ HEATS UP: SHIPS DON'T COME BACK |
| Thu, May 14 | 36.1% | 63.9% | XI PUTS TAIWAN ON THE TABLE, SMILING |
| Wed, May 13 | 38.5% | 61.5% | PUTIN FIRES WORLD'S MOST POWERFUL MISSILE. FOR FUN. |
| Tue, May 12 | 40.2% | 59.8% | CEASEFIRE ON LIFE SUPPORT, WARPLANES ON STANDBY |
| Mon, May 11 | 40.1% | 59.9% | STRAIT STAYS SHUT AS BOTH SIDES DIG IN |
| Sun, May 10 | 36.3% | 63.7% | DEAD DICTATOR TRIGGERS END OF WORLD, AUTOMATICALLY |
| Sat, May 9 | 32.2% | 67.8% | WESTERN ALLIANCE SCRAMBLES TO PLUG DECADES-LONG HOLE |
| Fri, May 8 | 39.1% | 60.9% | TRUMP THREATENS IRAN WITH NUCLEAR GLOW |
| Thu, May 7 | 39.6% | 60.4% | NATO MEMBER JOINS THE ICBM CLUB |
| Wed, May 6 | 40.6% | 59.4% | DEAL MIRAGE SHIMMERS OVER THE STRAIT |
| Tue, May 5 | 43.5% | 56.5% | CEASEFIRE WOBBLES AS IRAN ATTACKS UAE |
| Mon, May 4 | 45.3% | 54.7% | MISSILES MEET 'PROJECT FREEDOM' IN THE STRAIT |
| Sun, May 3 | 42.9% | 57.1% | IRAN BLINKS — BUT TRUST IS THE MISSING POINT |
| Sat, May 2 | 42.7% | 57.3% | PRESIDENT INVENTS OWN WAR POWERS DOCTRINE |
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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