God, I frickin’ wish the end of the world were coming. I’d cash out my 401(k) and have the world’s best month-long vacation, then I’d see all you fuckers in hell.
Damn right. Heaven for climate, Hell for company.
For awhile I thought the End Of The World was supposed to be on 12-12-12 and was all upset because The Hobbit is scheduled to open on 12-14-12. Then I found out that the End is on 12-21-12, so I’m all happy again.
I start to get a little cranky about the jokes about the Mayas - not so much here, but about among some people in the media, who like to paint them as ignorant superstitious doomsayers to show off their own enlightenment.
Fact 1: The long count calender is a highly developed mathematical achievement.
Fact 2: The turnover on 21st dec 2012 is no different from earlier turnovers in 1618, 1224, 830, 435, 41 and before.
Fact 3: The world didn’t end then.
Fact 4: The ancient Mayans did not believe it would end in 2012.
Fact 5: Some idiots in the modern world misunderstood what a calender is and started peddling this apocalyptic bullshit.
At least here in Europe, I have heard the “Mayans are stupid” line way too often in the last months.
It is more than a little bit condescending and racist. Especially since there are estimated 7 million modern Maya alive today.
Ok, I’ve decided to let my gaming dice decide this:
First, I roll a d20 for prediction accuracy- critical miss means total failure to predict the future, critical hit mean infallibility, and other values indicate probability of following rolls being correct. I roll a… 16. So probably more accurate than not.
Next: 2d10 for predictability of apocalypse: low value means no one will see it coming, high value means some method exists of nailing it to the day. I roll a… 53. I take that to mean the broad outlines of the apocalypse can be forseen but not the specifics, and there’ll be some warning it’s coming but not far in advance.
Now: will I live to see it? I haven’t used my d12 yet so I’ll say even numbers are “yes” and odd numbers are “no”. I roll a… 7. However it occurs to me that I could either die tomorrow or unexpectedly live for centuries. Result useless, ignore.
Will I cause the apocalypse? That would require a d20 critical hit. I roll a… 18. Phew, that was close.
What will the nature of the apocalypse be? Religious (second coming, etc.)? Man made (nuclear war, etc.)? Natural (asteroid, ecological collapse, pandemic, etc.) Mystic (cosmic cycles) or Other? I’ll roll 2d10 for the following:
Religious 00-19
Man Made 20-39
Natural 40-59
Mystic 60-79
Other 80-99
I roll a… 34 Man Made it is.
Is this all bullshit? I roll d20 for a… 19.
No more Twinkies.
'Nuff said. Well played, Mayans.
Huh? How do you get a 53 rolling 2d10? 2d10 gives a range of 2 to 20…
I said that wrong. I meant roll two d10s
Still haven’t decided if I’m going to put in for an end of the world day and maybe get a long weekend if I’m lucky.
Really wish I knew ahead of time because my electric bill is due on the 22nd and I could really tie one on with that payment.
Thanks for the reminder, it gives me a good excuse to avoid actually trying on a wedding gown. “Sorry, Hun, but we should use that money for another party because the world is going to end before we get married.”
We’re having a theme party, but otherwise, yeah, not paying too much attention.
The apocalypse has been pretty well debunked both inside and outside Mayan mythology, even the Mayans don’t interpret it that way, and even if the world was ending, it’s ended several time before in the myths and is always created anew.
I do think humanity is getting close to a threshold on several fronts, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we reach some form of singularity in my lifetime. But I don’t think it’s progressing quickly enough to happen next month. Nor do I think it will be discrete enough of an event to happen on a particular date. And I think it will be of the progressive sort, not destructive. The world might end “as we know it” but we will keep on keeping on.
Oh, also reading the sequel to In the Courts of the Sun, an excellent time travel 2012 themed novel without any annoying woo.
I agree with your other statements, but not this one. Academics still don’t agree on this issue, and there are a lot of contradictory examples in the archaeology. It seems that the Mayans never actually sat down and agreed on what to do about it.
Where’d this apocalypse bullshit come from? It will be… just like a light switch being turned off. We won’t even notice.
LOL come on now, the ancient peoples were nothing if not theatrical. Surely the world will end with the appropriate amount of CGI.
Well not that it counts, Warren Jeffs, mormon, told his people living on the Arizona and Utah border to close their businesses and get right with the creator, him. Seems this one prophized the same thing and soom too. Keep the canned meat handy. Havent heard a word from MR Camp though I guess hes still angry it wasn’t when he wanted it to be, pouting. My self I like the idea of rolling the dice, where can I get a set of those? Do they come in Pink, and can you use then in a car like a iPhone, or is there an ap for that too ?
So when I win the PowerBall this week, you recommend I get the one-time cash rather than the installments?
No doubt we will start hearing about the end of the world in 2020 or something. Yes, Wikipedia lists the next possible date as 2020 (to 2037), from somebody who previously predicted it in 1962, go figure. Oh, and anybody recall anything about May 27 this year? Somebody predicted the end of the world on that date but I never heard of it until now (there were also two other predictions last year, besides the two from Camping; again, I didn’t know about them until I saw them on Wikipedia).
ETA: Another one that Wikipedia could include - Asteroid could SMASH INTO EARTH in 2040 (and others, although most (all?) are later found not to be a significant risk)
Just three weeks to go…
You know, the Earth has been a crazy old place. It’s had its ups and downs…but all and all I think humanity has had a pretty decent time. I, for one, am sorry to see it all go “poof!”
Anyway, I suppose we should post whatever we want now while we still can. Use the next three weeks wisely.
Yay! Can’t wait! 
It’s gotta be something that ends calendar time as we know it. If the Earth stops spinning and rotating around the sun, then it would be December 21st forever. We’d all keep living for a while, but the calendar would be obsolete.
Or if the earth blows up, then there’s not really calendar time anymore.
It seems to me if this is merely an extinction event, but Mother Earth is still doing what she does, then the calendar doesn’t really stop. Therefore, it can’t be any run-of-the-mill nuclear war or earthquake or radioactive flare.
I kind of like the “light switch” theory. The batteries on space time go dead and that’s all she wrote.