‘Doomsday’ Set for November 13, 2026: Scientists Predicted the Apocalypse 66 Years Ago

There is just one month to go until the predicted end of the world — at least according to a scientific paper published 66 years ago. In 1960, a study in the prestigious journal Science forecast that Doomsday would arrive on Friday, November 13, 2026, The Independent reports.

The paper was written by Austrian-born American physicist Heinz von Foerster and his colleagues at the University of Illinois. They examined historical population trends and concluded that the world’s population was growing along a hyper-exponential trajectory — accelerating so rapidly that it could eventually lead to catastrophic consequences.

“By this date, the population of the Earth will be infinite if it continues to grow as it has over the past two millennia,” the paper stated. “Our great-great-grandchildren will not starve. They will be squeezed to death by overpopulation,” the researchers warned.

When it was published, the study sparked debate among demographers. However, its projections of global population growth remained broadly in line with reality until the 1990s.

Since then, birth rates have fallen sharply in many countries. According to the latest United Nations projections, published in World Population Prospects, the global population is expected to peak at around 10.3 billion in 2084 before beginning to decline.

The 1960 study appeared at the height of the Cold War, when fears of a global catastrophe were fueled by concerns over dwindling natural resources and the spread of nuclear weapons.

More than six decades later, apocalyptic predictions are once again making headlines — this time amid the rapid development of artificial intelligence.

The so-called Doomsday Clock, created in 1947 by scientists at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, currently stands at 85 seconds to midnight. A year earlier, its hands were set at 89 seconds to midnight.

This is the closest the clock has ever been to its symbolic midnight. Scientists cite global war, climate change and the development of potentially uncontrollable artificial intelligence among the major threats facing humanity.

The date November 13, 2026, therefore appears in the scientific paper as a mathematical projection based on population growth trends, not as a confirmed prediction of the end of the world. More recent demographic estimates suggest that events have followed a different trajectory.