Life After December 21 2012
Ian spoke with Marie D. Jones about what we can expect in 2012 and what
it may be like in the year 2013. Jones went through some of the common
worst case scenarios (asteroid impact, pole shift, supervolcano
eruption) for December 21, 2012, and Ian invited callers to phone in
with their theories about what will happen on that date. Jones said she
does not think any naturally-occuring, world-ending event will take
place in 2012. For Jones, the worst case scenario will be human driven,
possibly a nuclear war. Jones and Ian also talked about the discrepancy
between the Mayan calendar and the Gregorian calendar.
Jones
envisioned what life may be like in the year 2013. She expressed concern
about the continued acceleration of technology and how it could
interfere with our ability to connect with each other. She also
discussed the threat of global climate change and the role of
traditional western religions in the future.
Wikipedia
The
2012 phenomenon comprises a range of eschatological beliefs according to
which cataclysmic or transformative events will occur on 21 December
2012. This date is regarded as the end-date of a 5,125-year-long cycle
in the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar. Various astronomical alignments
and numerological formulae have been proposed as pertaining to this
date, though none have been accepted by mainstream scholarship.
A
New Age interpretation of this transition is that this date marks the
start of time in which Earth and its inhabitants may undergo a positive
physical or spiritual transformation, and that 2012 may mark the
beginning of a new era. Others suggest that the 2012 date marks the end
of the world or a similar catastrophe. Scenarios suggested for the end
of the world include the arrival of the next solar maximum, an
interaction between Earth and the black hole at the center of the
galaxy, or Earth's collision with a planet called "Nibiru".
Scholars
from various disciplines have dismissed the idea of such cataclysmic
events occurring in 2012. Professional Mayanist scholars state that
predictions of impending doom are not found in any of the extant classic
Maya accounts, and that the idea that the Long Count calendar "ends" in
2012 misrepresents Maya history and culture
Astronomers and other
scientists have rejected the proposals as pseudoscience, stating that
they conflict with simple astronomical observations and amount to "a
distraction from more important science concerns, such as global warming
and loss of biological diversity"
Geomagnetic reversal
Another
idea tied to 2012 involves a geomagnetic reversal (often incorrectly
referred to as a pole shift by proponents), possibly triggered by a
massive solar flare, that would release an energy equal to 100 billion
atomic bombs. This belief is supposedly supported by observations that
the Earth's magnetic field is weakening, which could precede a reversal
of the north and south magnetic poles.
Author Graham Hancock, in
his book Fingerprints of the Gods, interpreted Coe's remarks in Breaking
the Maya Code as evidence for the prophecy of a global cataclysm.
Filmmaker Roland Emmerich would later credit the book with inspiring his
2009 disaster film 2012.
Other speculations regarding doomsday
in 2012 have included predictions by the Web Bot project, a computer
program that purports to predict the future using Internet chatter.
However, commentators have rejected the programmers' claims to have
successfully predicted natural disasters, which web chatter could never
predict, as opposed to human-caused disasters like stock market crashes.
Also,
the 2012 date has been loosely tied to the long-running concept of the
Photon Belt, which predicts a form of interaction between Earth and
Alcyone, the largest star of the Pleiades cluster. Critics have argued
that photons cannot form belts, that the Pleiades, located more than 400
light years away, could have no effect on Earth, and that the Solar
System, rather than getting closer to the Pleiades, is in fact moving
farther away from them.
The 2012 phenomenon has been discussed or
referenced in several media. Several TV documentaries, as well as many
contemporary fictional references to the year 2012 refer to 21 December
as the day of a cataclysmic event.
The History Channel has aired a
handful of special series on doomsday that include analysis of 2012
theories, such as Decoding the Past (2005--2007), 2012, End of Days
(2006), Last Days on Earth (2006), Seven Signs of the Apocalypse (2007),
and Nostradamus 2012 (2008).[136] The Discovery Channel also aired 2012
Apocalypse in 2009, suggesting that massive solar storms, magnetic pole
reversal, earthquakes, supervolcanoes, and other drastic natural events
may occur in 2012. In 2012, the National Geographic Channel launched a
show called Doomsday Preppers, a documentary series about survivalists
preparing for various cataclysms, including the 2012 doomsday.