POLL - Will the World End in 2012?

[doublehelix]

Prophets of doom have written many books and made many prognostications about 2012 being a really bad year. But doomsday predictions are nothing new. Here are a bunch of others that never panned out:

http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/ ... tions.html

[RamblinglyVeryBored]

2012
The Large Hadron Collider will see a flux of energy from space.
This will cause a wormhole, a portal, to open.
From within the alien reptilian invaders will return to the planet they seeded with human life long ago.
And then all of us that are of the video game generations get to put our first person shooter skills to the test!

Basically, science shows nothing of interest or importance will occur on this date to affect current life.
The increase in cosmic rays, gamma rays, etc. All have notes in the scientific world.
But none lead to the end of the world.
None even seriously affect us.
Some say "If" and only "If" then little things could occur. Like a loss of certain technologies. Or the jump start of the thousand to million year cycle it takes to create an Ice Age. Possibly even an increase in plant life.
But, those are "If"s that are right up there beside the Large Hadron Collider creating a black hole which will destroy us.
The fact some scientists see this as importance, means it should not just be dismissed as nonsense.
Simply, it is the same type of thing as at any given point in our future the sun could explode, something could hit us, the poles could shift, etc..etc. All things that are "possible" according to science but not "probable".

[Sagan1942]

5 stars for that post, Ramblingly!!
It will be up to Gordon Freeman to save us!!!

As far as the poll... Let me know when people start blood-letting from their genitals over local crops like the Mayans did or worshiping dead Mayan kings on the appropriate dates as SPECIFICALLY called for on the Mayan calendars. Man, I remember thinking that Y2K was the height of silliness but the general population continues to raise the bar.

A better poll question:
What will 2012 Doomsday advocates say by the time we start celebrating New Year's Day in 2013?
a) They will claim that they merely got the date wrong and will set a new Doomsday for 2016 so we'll have to listen to another three years of their garbage.
b) They will say that we JUST BARELY avoided an epic cataclysm and the human race ALMOST went extinct but we just didn't notice it. Man, we're lucky we dodged THAT bullet!
c) They will say that the cataclysm DID happen, and THEY were able to detect it...the rest of the world will soon start feeling the effects of this HUGE, EPIC, EARTH-CHANGING event any day now.....yep, any day.... Keep waiting for it, you WILL notice the effects ANY day now!

[forrest4]

I am wondering why I even took part in the poll. I can't believe people who still believe in this sort of non-sense. Oh well, it is what it is.

[netdragon]

Ummm... Who created this poll? Watch a little too much History channel? Now get educated:

The Mayan end time prophecy wasn't talking about the end of the world but the end of the "4th world" or epoch and start of the next epoch. They believed time was cyclical, so an end would be the start of a new age (but not the literal end of the world). They definitely believed time would continue after 2012 (give or take a year, depending on calendar interpretations). They also believed the 5th world would be more peaceful. It was purely astrological/astronomical in origin. They were very good at tracking space objects and precession.

Furthermore, the Mayans believed the 5th world would involve a "crowning" of earth as life on earth reaches eternal perfection.

[Tarius]

People have gotten so wrapped up in the end of the world talk, they forget to read that no where does it actually say the world is ending, except in modern literature.

[NowheremanSomewhereman]

The human race is more likely to nuke each other out of exsistance than another date picked out of a hat of possible cultures who poundered the same thing will we die out every century recorded had someone talking about it .....sounds alittle like BS or a distraction....

[rueh]

What I am wondering is who were the 31 people that are sure the world is going to end in 2012? And why have they not left any comments? Were they just clicking on the poll for fun or do they actually believe this?