BBC Focus Magazine

[King Random]

Don't think this is on a thread already, (if it is then feel free to lock this, though please give me the web address for it).

Anyway, do any of you believe in the world ending on December 2st?

Me, personally, I do not. I mean, the Mayans whose calendar it was are already extinct so what's the point of listening much to their calendar. And they might just of got tired of writing the calendar, it's not like they would write a calendar till the end of time itself.


Give opinions and why.

[The Beige Avenger]

The Mayan Calendar does not predict the end of the World in December.

There is no debate.

Rest easy.

[Shadowwolf]

It has come up before such as here but no worries or harm in raising it agin as we get closer to the damp squib.

As for why it won't be an issue, well our own calendar runs out every 365 days or so and nothing happens when it ends, this Mayan thing is somewhat similar, the calendar just ran out and needs a new one.

There are also no expected issues that they could have been aware of but we have somehow missed, even a rogue planet would be quite visible long before it crossed paths and there's nothing there. Or the mooted cataclysm is impossible, like dire effects of a planetary alignment or the planet reversing its rotation whilst the crust spins along the old direction of rotation.

This is why there has been a recent reappraisal of the source so that they may move the doomsday date to another far off point and not look foolish as the terrible day comes and goes with nothing happening.

[M Paul Lloyd]

I very much agree with the Beige one on this, it is just a coincidence and of no actual significance although those taken to doom saying will no doubt find something to make much of.

[King Random]

Yeah, agreed.
So many people think that the fact that the calendar happens to end there means that suddenly there will be a huge explosion (or whatever) and we will die. And, I think that quite a bit of this is just because the 'thing' is close by. As in, nobody saw it as something huge anyway when they first discovered this.

Also...: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news ... -new-year/

[Shadowwolf]

Another way of seeing it might be to think of it the way we did when we hit 2000, not many people get to go through the change of a millenium so it's probably the same momentous event to Mayans when a long calendar switches over and what I think that chief in your link above was getting at.

[King Random]

makes sense....