Mayan Calendar 2012

@dezrtfish:

@Commander:

Big strong men who are completely and utterly loyal to me are my security blanket.

:-D Mistress Jennifer… er… Ivanova… or whatever…

I do believe I used the plural. :P

@ncscswitch:

Actually they DID carve them in stone.  here is a picture of one of them…
http://www.globalartistvillage.org/gavblog/images-blog/mayan_calendar/mayan_calendar.gif

As far as the elephants, etc…
It is pretty certain that the Atlantic was crossed before the time of Columbus.  We know for certain that the Vikings reached Newfoundland.  And we know that there were a LOT of seafaring peoples in both the Atlantic and Pacific going back more than 3000 years.

Apropos of this, I am reading a book entitled “1423:  The Year China Discovered America.”  It’s about a Chinese super fleet that set sail circa 1421 and, according to the author, circumnavigated the globe nearly 70 years before Columbus sailed.  I haven’t finished it yet, but the guy is a retired submariner, so he knows a thing or two about navigation, and he bases his conclusions on maps dating from that time period, among other things.  It’s a fascinating read so far.  I actually put it down to read “The Nine” by Jeffrey Toobin, a very good book about the Supreme Court in recent years.  Yes, I’m a book nut.  So if I’m a little slow with my turns, odds are I have my nose stuck in a book . . .

silly rabbits apocalypsea are for fools.

One of the more common changes I have heard to come is the alignment of the planets in our solar system which occurs in 2012. This is somehow supposed to change the polarity of our planet’s magnetic field causing it to flip over so-to-speak.

The thing about the repolarisation of the earth will happen sooner or later, atleast according to my physics teacher…

It is also a near certainty based on geology as well.

The rock strata on either side of the Mid Atlantic Ridge show reversal of polarity on a pretty regular basis over the past several millions of years.

Sweet, that means all the yanks will become suthuners

I’m really not understanding why it would matter?  I highly doubt a major change to the Earth’s polarization or anything else is going to happen without a concerted human effort or long periods of time (in human perspective.  Thinking like 1000 years, etc.)

And even if it does change, I doubt it will have an adverse effect on the survivability of human beings on the planet.  We’ll have ice ages and heat waves due to changes in the currents, but we’re much more technologically capable of dealing with it then we were the last time the planet shifted.

Actually, it leaves us open for an intense climatological shift.  If the reversal coincides with an increase in solar activity, the Van Allen Belts will be in flux from the reversal and it could be ugly…

Beyond that possibility, discussion of the topic is out of my area of knowledge.

I guess our magnetic field does protect us from Solar Storms.  But even so, couldn’t NASA warn us when to be inside so we don’t get too affected by it?

In other words, I fail to see how any of this would impact the survival of the human race as a species and first world nations in specific.

Jen, it is not the solar storm itself that is the issue (though that could be ugly in and of itself).  But if the Van Allen belts have been scrambled by  polarity reversal, the energy of a major storm would hit in concentrated strings and points as it was refracted moving through the twisted belt.  You could potentially have effects like a microwave beam hitting different areas that could cause huge problems, most importantly in upsetting the normal heat/cold flow patterns of air and water.  That level of major instability in the atmosphere would create some hellacious storms could be of magnitudes not known in human history.

Along with it you add in massive electronic destruction, radio interruption, etc. so that communications and emergency response becomes problematic…

Look at the effects of El Nino and La Nina on weather.  That is one current in one area of the Pacific that disrupts “normal” temperature change and flow.  Now instead of El Nino, substitute one area of super heated water in say the Bearing Straits…