2012: Judgment Day or Disaster Movie Excuse?

Twenty twelve is set to be a momentous time, the first winter youth Olympic games will be held in January, the United States are going to hold a presidential election and the UK are going to celebrate the diamond jubilee of Queen Elizabeth. But if you're looking forward to 2013 you shouldn't get your hopes up, given that based on some prophecies, the entire world is due to end on December 21. If you happen to take pleasure in Christmas, take full advantage of this year and the next, since according to the Mayan calendar, they'll be your very last. Perhaps.

Well before Europeans showed up in meso America the populace implemented a complicated mixture of calendars to record their days.  The Haab or solar calendar, both a timepiece and Mayan art form, was constructed from eighteen 20 day months and also a interval of 5 days known as Wayeb to bring the total to 365.

The Tzolkin on the other hand was a cycle of 260 days, 13 times twenty.  No-one knows quite exactly why 260 days were chosen, although it seems the numbers thirteen along with 20 were both significant to these earlier civilizations. There exists a probability that it was associated with the time period in between a woman's first missed period and the birth of  her child, and made it easier to foresee when a infant would be born, however other notions about crop growing and astrological observations may be equally accurate. Most dates could possibly be set by a mix of the Haab and Tzolin, the period would come along one time every 52 years, that is approximately once in every life span.

To observe intervals for a longer period than 52 years the Mayans utilized a different method which we now refer to as the Long Count calendar. This method is demonstrated in both Olmec and Aztec art and wasn't invented by the Maya. Dates run forwards from the mythic day zero, the date from the introduction of the existing world. Like all civilizations the base units were days, with twenty days in a uinal and eighteen uinals in the tun (roughly a year). A K'atun consisted of twenty tuns and 20 of these a b'ak'tun. Again the number thirteen was important and quite a few inscriptions in Mayan art show the date changing at the conclusion of 13 b'ak'tuns and talked of incidents to occur on this particular date. This lead to  hypotheses that the Mayans expected something major would occur around the final day of the 13th B'ak'tun. That day is calculated to be 21st or 23 December 2012. So what might we expect?

Well according to many scholars nothing in the least. There are some references to things taking place about that point in time in inscriptions, however nothing very concrete, therefore it's surprising the amount of publicity 2012 is generating. Many say there will a religious evolution, while others talk about a momentous galactic alignment, even though this is based on the positioning of the galactic equator, and that cannot be established, this doesn't seem very likely. Yet others worry about planet Niburu.

Collision with planet X (or Niburu) has been forecast since 2003, however any planet near enough to be in collision with the Earth in 2012 would certainly now become plainly visible to astronomers in the night sky. Unfortunately this fictional collision is now confused in the media with the actual and predicted approach of a giant asteroid referred to as Eros which is expected to pass the earth in 2012. Eros is greater than the asteroid that we believe killed the dinosaurs 65 millions years back but since it will never be nearer than 70 times the distance of the moon, it is unlikely to do any damage.

Looking at the Mayan calendar is a great reason to consider how we measure time and the reason why, to be aware of the solar cycles which still rule our life and also to enjoy the fine art of society. As to preparing for the end of the world, that still seems somewhat premature.