Sixty four years ago, on this day, November 17th, 1961, the Twilight Zone got ecological…
Nov 17 1961 – “The Midnight Sun” is episode 75 of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone, first shown in November, 1961.
Opening narration
The word that Mrs. Bronson is unable to put into the hot, still, sodden air is ‘doomed,’ because the people you’ve just seen have been handed a death sentence. One month ago, the Earth suddenly changed its elliptical orbit and in doing so began to follow a path which gradually, moment by moment, day by day, took it closer to the Sun. And all of man’s little devices to stir up the air are now no longer luxuries—they happen to be pitiful and panicky keys to survival. The time is five minutes to twelve, midnight. There is no more darkness. The place is New York City and this is the eve of the end, because even at midnight it’s high noon, the hottest day in history, and you’re about to spend it in the Twilight Zone. Whether explicitly nuclear or otherwise, the apocalypse was never far away [in the Twilight Zone]. “The Midnight Sun” was telecast on the day the U.S. consolidated its drive for “push-button warfare” with the first successful launching of a Minuteman missile from an underground silo. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Midnight_Sun_(The_Twilight_Zone)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 317ppm. As of 2025, when this post was published, it is 430ppm. This matters because the more carbon dioxide in the air, the more heat gets trapped. The more heat, the more extreme weather events. You can make it more complicated than that if you want, but really, it’s not. Fwiw, I have a tattoo of the Keeling Curve on my left forearm.
The broader context was that it was the early 1960s – fears of nuclear war, of war by weather modification etc was in the air (not gonna apologise). See this from LBJ, who by this time was Kennedy’s Vice-President.
What I think we can learn from this – science fiction tries to tackle this stuff. The best sci-fi is “good for thinking with.”
What happened next – the Cuban Missile Crisis etc. And the emissions, they kept climbing.
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
Also on this day:
November 17, 1869 – Suez Canal opens – All Our Yesterdays
November 17, 1968 -The Observer covers carbon dioxide pollution… – All Our Yesterdays
November 17, 1968 – UK national newspaper flags carbon dioxide danger…
November 17, 1978 – British Wind Energy Association launches –
November 17, 1980 – International meeting about carbon dioxide build up.
November 17, 1994 – “When consumption is no longer sustainable”… –
November 17, 2018 – XR occupy five bridges in London
November 17, 2023 – two degrees warmer, for the first time… – All Our Yesterdays