THE MAYAN CALENDAR
| As midnight marched across the world's time zones last night, people welcomed the start of a new year, ushering out the old and toasting the new. From Beijing to Moscow, Beirut to Paris, and London to New York, parties, fireworks and festivals welcomed 2012, the Year of the Dragon in the Chinese Lunar Calendar. Gathered here are images from these celebrations last night, and the many people who took part. Happy New Year everyone, may it be a fantastic year for you and yours. |  |
The Mayans reveal their darkest mysteries: New excavation reveals secrets of their calendar - including black-clad figures and symbols never seen before
A vast city built by the ancient Mayan civilisation and discovered nearly a century ago in modern day Guatemala is finally starting to yield its secrets - including a hint that apocalyptic predictions around the 'end' of the Mayan Calendar may be wrong. Excavating for the first time in the sprawling complex of Xultzn in Guatemala's Peten region, archaeologists have uncovered a structure that contains what appears to be a work space for the town's scribe. Its walls are adorned with unique paintings - one depicting a line-up of men in black uniforms, and hundreds of scrawled numbers - many calculations relating to the Mayan calendar, and stretching up to 7,000 years into the future. Scroll down for video:
The painted figure of a man - possibly a scribe - is illuminated in the doorway of the Mayan dwelling, which holds symbols never seen before
Angelyn Bass cleans and stabilizes the surface of a wall of a Maya house that dates to the 9th century A.D. A mysterious figure is shown painted on the wall in the foreground
Four long numbers on the north wall of the ruined house relate to the Maya calendar and computations about the moon, sun and possibly Venus and Mars; the dates may stretch some 7,000 years into the future. These are the first calculations Maya archaeologists have found that seem to tabulate all of these cycles in this way
Mayan temples in Guatemala: Researchers have found walls adorned with unique paintings - one depicting a line-up of men in black uniforms, and hundreds of scrawled numbers - many calculations relating to the Mayan calendar
Never-before-seen artwork - the first to be found on walls of a Maya house - adorn the dwelling in the ruined city of Xultún
The Mayan sites in Guatemala have been investigated by scientists since the Seventies The excavations, which were funded by National Geographic, have already revealed details about the Mayan calendar and the lives of the inhabitants which were previously unknown. One wall of the structure, thought to be a house, is covered with tiny, millimetre-thick, red and black glyphs unlike any seen before at other Mayan sites. Some appear to represent the various calendrical cycles charted by the Mayans - the 260-day ceremonial calendar, the 365-day solar calendar, the 584-day cycle of the planet Venus and the 780-day cycle of Mars. Four long numbers on the north wall of the ruined house relate to the Maya calendar and computations about the moon, sun and possibly Venus and Mars; the dates may stretch some 7,000 years into the future. ‘Why would they go into those numbers if the world is going to come to an end this year?’ observed Anthony Aveni of Colgate University in Hamilton, N.Y., an expert on Mayan astronomy. ‘You could say a number that big at least suggests that time marches on.’ These are the first calculations Maya archaeologists have found that seem to tabulate all of these cycles in this way. Although they all involve common multiples of key calendrical and astronomical cycles, the exact significance of these particular spans of time is not known. Archaeologist William Saturno, of Boston University in the United States who led the exploration and excavation, said: ‘For the first time we get to see what may be actual records kept by a scribe, whose job was to be official record keeper. ‘It's like an episode of TV's 'Big Bang Theory,' a geek math problem and they're painting it on the wall. They seem to be using it like a blackboard.’ Anthony Aveni, professor of astronomy and anthropology at Colgate University, said: ‘It's like the odometer of a car, with the Maya calendar rolling over from the 120,000s to 130,000.
Archaeologist William Saturno of Boston University carefully uncovers art and writings left by the Maya some 1,200 years ago DO THE MAYANS PREDICT THE WORLD WILL END IN 2012?Inscriptions on Mayan tablets found in temples such as Tortuguero refer to 'the end' - and many internet conspiracy theories have predicted our world will be swallowed by a black hole, hit by an asteroid or devoured by ancient gods. But many ethnic Mayans dismiss the apocalyptic predictions as largely a Western idea. Rather than the end of time itself, the inscriptions refer to the start of a new era. The paintings represent the first Maya art to be found on the walls of a house. The walls reveal the oldest known astronomical tables from the Maya. Scientists already knew they must have been keeping such records at that time, but until now the oldest known examples dated from about 600 years later. Astronomical records were key to the Mayan calendar, which has gotten some attention recently because of doomsday warnings that it predicts the end of the world this December. Experts say it makes no such prediction. The new finding provides a bit of backup: The calculations include a time span longer than 6,000 years that could extend well beyond 2012. Aveni, along with William Saturno of Boston University and others, report the discovery in Friday's issue of the journal Science. The room, a bit bigger than 6-feet square, is part of a large complex of Mayan ruins in the rain forest at Xultun in northeastern Guatemala. The walls also contain portraits of a seated king and some other figures, but it's clear those have no connection to the astronomical writings, the scientists said. One wall contains a calendar based on phases of the moon, covering about 13 years. The researchers said they think it might have been used to keep track of which deity was overseeing the moon at particular times. Aveni said it would allow scribes to predict the appearance of a full moon years in advance, for example. Such record-keeping was key to Mayan astrology and rituals, and maybe would be used to advise the king on when to go to war or how good this year's crops would be, he said. ‘`What you have here is astronomy driven by religion,’ he said. On an adjacent wall are numbers indicating four time spans from roughly 935 to 6,700 years. It's not clear what they represent, but maybe the scribes were doing calculations that combined observations from important astronomical events like the movements of Mars, Venus and the moon, the researchers said. Why bother to do that? Maybe the scribes were ‘geeks ... who just got carried away with doing these kinds of computations and calculations, and probably did them far beyond the needs of ordinary society,’ Aveni suggested. Experts unconnected with the discovery said it was a significant advance. ‘It's really a wonderful surprise,’ said Simon Martin, co-curator of an exhibit about the Mayan calendar at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. While the results of the scribes' work were known from carvings on monuments, ‘we've never really been able to identify a working space, or how they actually went about things,’ Martin said. The new work gives insight into that, he said, and the fact the room had a stone roof rather than thatching supports previous indications that the scribes enjoyed a high social standing. ‘It's a very important discovery. We're only getting a glimpse of it’ in the published paper, said John B. Carlson, director of the Center for Archaeoastronomy in College Park, Md. ‘This is an intriguing start for this discovery.’ Xultzn, a 12 square mile site where tens of thousands once lived, was first discovered about 100 years ago by Guatemalan workers and roughly mapped in the 1920s by Sylvanus Morley, who named the site ‘Xultzn’ - ‘end stone.’ Scientists from Harvard University mapped more of the site in the 1970s. The house discovered by Prof Saturno's team was numbered 54 of 56 structures counted and mapped at that time. Thousands at Xultzn remain uncounted. The team's excavations reveal that monumental construction at Xultzn began in the first centuries B.C. The site thrived until the end of the Classic Maya period; the site's last carved monument dates to around 890 A.D. Prof Saturno saidd: ‘It's weird that the Xultzn finds exist at all. Such writings and artwork on walls don't preserve well in the Maya lowlands, especially in a house buried only a meter below the surface.’ Prof Aveni added: ‘The most exciting point is that we now see that the Maya were making such computations hundreds of years - and in places other than books - before they recorded them in the Codices.’ The findings were reported in National Geographic magazine and in the journal Science.
The financial crisis threatens to drag the world back to the dark days of the 1930s and wipe out the gains of globalisation, a hard-hitting report said tonight. In its annual assessment of the global economy, the World Economic Forum warned of a rising tide of protectionism, nationalism and protests as seen during the Great Depression. It blamed the ‘chronic’ state of government finances and the widening gap between the rich and poor as the world lurches from one crisis to another.
Fearing a repeat: A hard-hitting report has warned the world could be dragged back into the dark days of the 1930s and the Great Depression due to the global financial crisis The WEF, which holds its yearly meeting for leading politicians, economists, businessmen and academics in the Swiss ski resort of Davos later this month, said the ‘seeds of dystopia’ have been sown. It warned that without action to tackle youth unemployment and support an ageing population the world would become ‘a place where life is full of hardship and devoid of hope’. The survey of 469 global experts warned the world was ‘vulnerable’ to fresh economic shocks, major social unrest, and food and water crises.Lee Howell, managing director of the WEF, said: ‘For the first time in generations, many people no longer believe that their children will grow up to enjoy a higher standard of living than theirs. ‘This new malaise is particularly acute in the industrialised countries that historically have been a source of great confidence and bold ideas.’
Meeting: The World Economic Fund will hold its yearly conference in Davos, Switzerland, later this month The growing number of young people who cannot find a job and the increasing number of the elderly depending on debt-ridden states are ‘fuelling resentment worldwide’, it said in the Global Risks 2012 report. ‘Both young and old could face an income gap as well as a skills gap so wide as to threaten social and political stability,’ said the WEF. ‘This could precipitate a downward spiral of the global economy fuelled by protectionism, nationalism and populism.’
Ruinous consequences: Sir Mervyn King warned of the impact on the global economy if policies used by 1930s Governments were repeated The Great Depression of the Thirties was exacerbated by a wave of protectionism that saw governments impose tariffs of imports in a desperate effort to protect their own manufacturers. Bank of England Governor Sir Mervyn King has warned that a rerun of those policies would have ‘ruinous consequences’ for the global economy. The WEF issued a call to arms as it warned that debt-ridden governments could no longer ensure higher living standards for future generations. ‘Individuals are increasingly being asked to bear risks previously assumed by governments and companies to obtain a secure retirement and access to quality healthcare,’ said John Drzik, chief executive of management consultants Oliver Wyman. ‘This report is a wake-up call to both the public and the private sectors to come up with constructive ways to realign the expectations of an increasingly anxious global community.’ The report welcomed advances in communications and technology but warned that there is a ‘dark side to connectivity’ which left society vulnerable to ‘malicious’ and ‘devastating’ cyber-attacks. ‘The Arab Spring demonstrated the power of interconnected communications services to drive personal freedom, yet the same technology facilitated the riots in London,’ said Steve Wilson, chief risk officer for general insurance at insurance giant Zurich. Germany's economy slipped into reverse in the last quarter of 2011, despite showing strong overall growth of 3 per cent for the year. The country's Federal Statistics Office said the economy was likely to contract by 0.25 per cent in the fourth quarter, although that figure will not be confirmed until next month. Joerg Kraemer, chief economist for Commerzbank, said he expected the economy to shrink in the first quarter of 2012 as well - technically putting Germany in a recession.
Shrinking: A worker at a solar company in Bitterfeld-Wolfen, Germany. The German economy contracted by 0.25% in the final quarter of 2011 The most recent economic indicators suggest 2012 will be a tough year, both for Germany and the rest of Europe. Ferdinand Fichtner, head of the DIW economic institute, said: 'While the German economy grew very strongly in the last two years, this year's growth will be much lower, especially because of the crisis in the eurozone.' Germany's annual growth rate was achieved in spite of the financial crisis besetting Europe, which has other economies including Greece, Spain and Italy struggling with huge debts and slumping output.The country's 2011 growth puts it in a small group of strongly performing eurozone countries, including Finland, Austria, Slovakia and Luxembourg.
Export driven: Shipping containers in Duisburg harbour, Germany. The economy grew 3 per cent in 2011 overall, but 2012 is expected to be much tougher France will see more moderate growth of around 1.7 per cent for the year, according to the International Monetary Fund, while output stagnates amid high unemployment in Spain and Italy. Britain's economy went from a 0.5 per cent contraction in the final quarter of 2010, to 0.5 per cent growth in the third quarter of 2011, suggesting the economy will have grown slightly. Greece and Portugal, bailed out to avoid default, are both in deep recession. Germany is expected to outperform the U.S., which announces its 2011 GDP data on January 27 and is expected to have grown by 1.6 per cent for the year.
Testing times: Chancellor Angela Merkel has met with other European leaders this week to discuss the eurozone crisis But that figure remains far short of emerging economies like China - at an estimated 9.5 per cent - or India, with 7.8 per cent. Its performance means Germany's deficit is down to only 1 per cent of GDP - well below the 3 per cent limit enshrined in the eurozone's rules. In 2010, the German economy grew by 3.7 per cent after a painful contraction of 5.1 per cent in 2009. Simon Junker, an expert with the DIW institute, warned expectations for the economy in 2012 were dampened by the eurozone crisis and both exports and imports would slow down. 'Germany's strongly export-driven economy will not be able to elude the slowdown of the global economy,' he said. 'Especially German exports will suffer from the eurozone crisis.' But the DIW said there was reason to be optimistic if eurozone governments 'manage to quickly and believably contain the crisis'
Will the world end on December 21, 2012? The unsettling evidence behind ancient astrologers' claim and the film they inspiredA tidal wave engulfs the Himalayas. A tsunami scoops up a warship and dumps it on the White House. The Great Wall of China crumbles and thousands of screaming tourists plummet to their deaths. Soon the horrors reach British shores. A massive earthquake sends Big Ben crashing to the ground and destroys the newly-built Olympic stadium, great surges in our rivers drown millions up and down the country, and plunging asteroids turn our towns and cities into smoking ruins. Those who survive the initial onslaught flee in terror, but to run is futile for this is the ultimate catastrophe — the end of the world, as predicted by the Hollywood disaster movie 2012, which opens next month.
Domesday: Scenes from Roland Emmerich's new disaster movie, 2012 Starring John Cusack and Thandie Newton, 2012 is directed by Roland Emmerich, whose previous films, Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow, have conjured up similarly apocalyptic visions — with Earth invaded by hostile aliens, or threatened with the sudden onset of a new Ice Age. While these have been dismissed as entertaining bunkum, Emmerich’s latest effort is causing rather more of a stir. Its plot revolves around a real-life prediction that the world will end on December 21, 2012, and many doomsayers claim there is evidence to suggest that this prophecy will come true. In America, they include Richard Heene, the Colorado father who created a worldwide frenzy when he claimed, falsely, that his six-year-old son Falcon had floated off in a home-made helium balloon shaped like a UFO. It has since emerged that Heene planned to build an underground bunker to protect his family in the event of the sun exploding in 2012. Whether his strange craft was part of his escape plan has yet to be established, but Heene is far from alone in his fear of this imminent Armageddon. Far-fetched though it sounds, rumours about what might happen in 2012 are fuelling so much hysteria that NASA has had to intervene to allay public fears. ‘Two years ago, I got a question each week about 2012,’ says David Morrison, director of NASA’s Lunar Science Institute in California. ‘Now I’m getting a dozen a day and people are really worried. ‘A couple of teenagers over here have told me they were contemplating suicide rather than facing the end of the world and I’ve also had quite a few questions from England. ‘One of the saddest inquiries was from a woman who said her only friend was her cat. ‘She wanted to know if she should have him put down before 2012 so that he wouldn’t suffer.’ Morrison has posted a list of 20 questions and answers on NASA’s website to address people’s worries. But fascination with our apparently looming annihilation continues to grow — with more than 175 books about it advertised on the Amazon website alone, and some ghoulish entrepreneurs even offering 2012 survival kits. So, what has led to such alarm about 21/12/2012, a date causing panic not seen since fears about the Millennium computer bug in the year 2000?
Worrying prediction or hokum? Another scene from 2012 Is it all nonsense or could we really be only three years away from Doomsday? This belief in our imminent demise is based on a calendar produced by the ancient Mayan civilisation, which flourished in the steamy rainforests of central America for nearly 2,000 years until its mysterious collapse around AD900. Today its abandoned temples and palaces have been engulfed by the lush green vegetation of the jungle, their rooms inhabited only by wild animals and birds — yet this was once one of the sophisticated societies of its day. Without wheels or metal tools to help them, the Mayans built many splendid stone buildings, including intricately designed observatories in which they developed a highly advanced understanding of astronomy. Scanning the heavens for many centuries and noting any association between the movement of the celestial bodies and events on Earth, they produced complicated almanacs full of horrifying imagery. The rising of the planet Venus in the morning, a sign believed to augur Mayan success in war, was represented by pictures of decapitated heads, while the lunar eclipses were symbolised by drawings of a dead goddess with a rope around her neck. Eclipses were thought to be a time of great danger for women, and a period when many children would be born deaf or blind. For all their gruesome illustrations, these almanacs were remarkably accurate in their astronomical calculations. With neither telescopes nor other equipment at their disposal, the Mayans managed to calculate that a lunar month — the period between successive new moons — lasted 29.5305 days, just 34 seconds away from what we now know to be its actual length. They also accurately forecast the movements of planets including Jupiter and Mars, and the occurrence of both solar and lunar eclipses for many centuries to come. Given these very precise predictions, Doomsday theorists are alarmed that the Mayan ‘Long Count’ Calendar, as it is known, appears to end abruptly on a date they recorded as 13.0.0.0. On the Gregorian calendar which we use today, this corresponds to December 21, 2012. The only clue as to what the Mayans thought might happen on that day comes from an ancient stone tablet, discovered during roadworks in Mexico back in the Sixties. Carved upon it are hieroglyphics that refer to the year 2012 and an event that will involve Bolon Yokte, the Mayan god of war and creation. Weathering and a crack in the stone have made the last part of the inscription illegible, but Mexican archaeologists have interpreted it as saying: ‘He will descend from the sky.’ Might this be a warning of impending divine wrath? Those who believe so include journalist Michael Drosnin, author of the best-selling book The Bible Code, which describes the work of three Israeli mathematicians who analysed the Book of Genesis using a computer.
Apocalypse: A wave of catastrophe hits the earth in the film They supposedly discovered coded references to the names of 66 legendary rabbis who lived and died many centuries after Genesis was written. The text was also said to contain hidden details of the rabbis’ birth and death dates, and of the towns and cities in which they would live. Continuing this analysis, Drosnin claimed to have found encoded descriptions of the Earth being pounded by comets in the year 2012. Others have suggested that, on the day in question, the winter solstice, the sun will be in exact alignment with the centre of our galaxy. According to Lawrence Joseph, author of a book called Apocalypse 2012, unspecified gravitational and energy forces may be acting on us from the centre of the milky way — and, if disrupted, he speculates they would throw our bodies and our planet out of kilter, resulting in catastrophe. He compares this to the way in which even a momentary disruption of electrical power can cause the clocks on DVD players and microwaves to blink meaninglessly. But this theory is debunked by David Morrison of NASA. ‘The galactic centre is very far away, approximately 30,000 light years, so it has negligible effects on the solar system or the Earth,’ he says. ‘In fact, the sun goes in the general direction of the galaxy’s centre every December and nothing at all happens.’ Morrison also refutes a popular internet theory that worldwide devastation will be caused by Earth’s magnetic polarity suddenly changing and throwing its direction of rotation into reverse. ‘The Earth has been rotating in the same direction for the past four billion years,’ he says. ‘The magnetic polarity does change every few hundred thousand years and the last time was about 400,000 years ago, but there is no evidence to suggest that it will happen again any time soon. ‘Even if it does, it has no bearing on the direction in which the Earth spins, and there is no reason to think it will do any other harm.’
One idea with at least some credibility is that the Earth will one day be hit by a large extra-terrestrial object. But David Morrison dismisses the idea put forward in the film that this will be a mysterious planet known as Nibiru — long the subject of speculation among the gloom-mongers of cyberspace. Niburu was supposedly first identified by the Sumerian people, who lived 5,000 years ago in what is now southern Iraq and it is said to be heading towards Earth at an alarming rate. Astronomers insist that there is no such planet but, much to Morrison’s frustration, this only increases suspicion that governments worldwide are concealing its existence to avoid global panic. ‘The simple laws of planetary motion tell you that if this thing really was only three years away from hitting Earth, it would be the brightest thing in the sky apart from the sun and the moon,’ he says. ‘It would have been tracked by thousands of amateur and professional astronomers all over the world. You just can’t hide a planet.’ Fictitious though planet Nibiru is, the Earth has always been subject to strikes by comets and asteroids. But to do any real damage, an object would have to be more than a mile wide. Such big hits are rare and the last was 65 million years ago, leading to the extinction of the dinosaurs. Searches of the cosmos for potential collisions up to 100 years into the future by NASA’s Near Earth Object Program led to them reporting that there are no serious threats in the offing and, even if a sizeable projectile did hit us, it might not wipe us out altogether. ‘There would be global firestorms and severe acid rain,’ says Don Yeomans, manager of the programme. ‘But all of these effects are relatively short-term, so the most adaptable species, like cockroaches and humans, would be likely to survive.’ According to Bill McGuire, Professor of Geophysical and Climate Hazards at University College London, we are 12 times more likely to experience the explosion of a super-volcano — defined as an eruption that expels 1,000 cubic kilometres or more of debris, enough to obliterate an area the size of Yorkshire. The site that currently gives most cause for concern is Yellowstone Volcano in the American state of Wyoming, which continues to rumble ominously and could explode with the force of 1,000 Hiroshima bombs and plunge the planet into a nuclear winter. ‘There would be great clouds of sulphur gas that would mix with the water in the atmosphere to form a veil over the Earth, cutting out sunlight and dramatically cooling the Earth’s surface,’ says Professor McGuire. ‘Plants would be unable to photosynthesise and there would be widespread crop failures, famine and starvation. ‘A super-volcano probably wouldn’t kill all of us, but there would be a devastating impact on our global economy and society.’ One thing the scientists agree upon is that life on Earth will one day come to an end. The constantly diminishing supplies of hydrogen in the sun, as in all ageing stars, will cause it to swell up and become what astronomers call a ‘red giant’. It will then engulf us before collapsing in on itself and becoming a ‘white dwarf’.
Chichen-Itza, Mexico: The Mayans, who built this pyramid, prospered for 2,000 years until their ‘Long Count’ Calendar abruptly ended on the date 13.0.0.0., which in our modern system corresponds to December 21, 2012 The good news is that this is unlikely to happen for another four billion years or so. And since none of the other aforementioned fates is likely to befall us for a very long time to come, if at all, we are probably safe to get on with our Christmas plans for 2012. We cannot be too complacent about mankind’s longevity, however. Quite apart from the much trumpeted dangers of global warming, some experts suggest that the Earth’s magnetic field — which is crucial for deflecting solar radiation and channelling it into belts that harmlessly circle the planet — will diminish to the point where it can no longer protect us from the sun’s rays. This could lead to an epidemic of cancers and a major disruption of the food chain. Compasses would stop working, animals would be unable to find their way back to breeding grounds, and the weather would become less predictable. The Earth would become unstable, unleashing a series of natural disasters. Such a lingering end to humanity’s time on Earth might not be the stuff of Hollywood blockbusters, but it lends a chilling resonance to the final lines of TS Eliot’s famous poem The Hollow Men, penned in the aftermath of World War One. This is the way the world ends. This is the way the world ends. This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but a whimper. Why the world will NOT end in 2012: Nasa scientist debunks conspiracy theories
Skyscrapers crumble to the ground, fiery meteorites smash into Earth and a Tibetan monk cowers as a massive tidal wave swamps his mountain retreat. It is a vision of the coming apocalypse thrillingly captured in the latest Hollywood blockbuster. But fears that the world is due to end in December 2012 is just a myth fuelled by internet rumour, according to a leading Nasa scientist.
Doomsday? The film 2012 will inflame existing fears about the possible end of the world Dr David Morrison, who runs the space agency's 'Ask an Astrobiologist' service, says he has received more than a thousand emails from those worried that the world is due to end in 2012. In an article published by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Dr Morrison has answered the top 20 questions in an attempt to assuage these fears.According to the theories on the internet, the calendar used by the ancient civilisation of the Mayans is due to come to an end in December 2012. Luckily for conspiracy theorists, this coincides neatly with predictions by an obscure sci-fi author, who wrote about the ancient Mesopotamian civilization of Sumer, that a planet named Nibiru will collide with the Earth on that date. The Mayan calendar ends in 2012, but Dr Morrison said this did not mean the world would end Fears have been further inflamed by an apocalyptic film called '2012' starring John Cusack, which is out this November. A quick search on Amazon reveals there are 175 books listed that deal with 2012 doomsday. First off Dr Morrison dismisses the possibility that the planet Nibiru even exists. He writes: 'The bottom line is that Nibiru is a myth, with no basis in fact. 'To an astronomer, persistent claims about a planet that is "nearby" but “invisible” are just plain silly.' And Dr Morrison laughs off suggestions that the government has been complicit in hiding its existence from the public. 'Even if they wanted to, the government could not keep Nibiru a secret,' he says. 'If it were real, it would be tracked by thousands of astronomers, amateurs as well a professional. These astronomers are spread all over the world. 'I know the astronomy community, and these scientists would not keep a secret even if ordered to. You just can’t hide a planet on its way to the inner solar system!' He also addresses the concerns of those who worry that the Mayan calendar is due to end in 2012. 'Ancient calendars are interesting to historians, but they cannot match the ability we have today to keep track of time, or the precision of the calendars currently in use. 'The main point, however, is that calendars, whether contemporary or ancient, cannot predict the future of our planet or warn of things to happen on a specific date such as 2012. 'I note that my desk calendar ends much sooner, on December 31 2009, but I do not interpret this as a prediction of Armageddon. It is just the beginning of a new year.' He added although many believe prophecies by the sixteenth century seer Nostradamus predict the end of the world in 2012, there is no evidence he has correctly predicted anything. He also tackles the belief circulating on some internet forums that an alignment of planets in our galaxy the Milky Way could in some way disrupt the Earth's gravitational field or reverse the Earth's rotation. 'A reversal in the rotation of Earth is impossible. It has never happened and never will,' he said. He added that although the magnetic polarity of Earth does take place around every 400,000 years scientists don't believe it will take place for another few millennia and there is no evidence it would do any harm.
Nasa scientist David Morrison (left) has moved to calm fears that the world will end in 2012, as predicted by sixteenth century seer Nostradamus (right) Publicity for the film '2012' also comes under attack for stirring up fear about the date. Like many Hollywood blockbusters nowadays, '2012' uses a sophisticated PR campaign which incorporates elements of 'viral' marketing. In the trailer for the film, which plays on conspiracy theorists' fears that the truth is being somehow hidden, viewers are directed to a 'faux scientific' website. The website purports to be the home for The Institute for Human Continuity, an entirely fictitious organisation which allows visitors to sign up for a lottery which will decide who will be saved when Armageddon comes. 'The whole 2012 disaster scenario is a hoax, fueled by ads for the Hollywood science-fiction disaster film “2012”,' he says. 'I can only hope that most people are able to distinguish Hollywood film plots from reality.' Dr Morrison noted that a growing interest in outer space has led to a general 'cosmophobia', that is a fear of the cosmos. He said he found people were frequently worried about the sun's magnetic field, solar storms, black holes and a rift in the Milky Way. 'Previously these would have merely been interesting astronomical ideas to explore, but now for many young people (who read misinformation about them on the web) they are objects of dread. 'This cosmophobia could be one of the worst long-term consequences of the 2012 doomsday hoax - to make people fearful of astronomy and the universe.'
2012: Where Do We Go From Here?
By Bernie Sanders, Green Mountain Daily The year 2011 has been a tough one for Vermont and our country. The recession caused by the greed, recklessness and illegal behavior of Wall Street continues. While Vermont is doing better economically than much of the country, too many of our friends and neighbors are unemployed or underemployed or are earning less than they need to adequately support their families. Further, in Vermont we have had to deal with the devastation of Hurricane Irene, which caused so much hardship for individuals and businesses. We should all be grateful for the efforts of state and local officials, first responders, the many hundreds of volunteers, and members of the National Guard who all did such an extraordinary job in the cleanup and recovery effort. The American people want action. They want their government to start representing the 99 percent, not just the top 1 percent. With that goal in mind, let me say a few words about some of the issues that I will be working on when Congress reconvenes in January. With more than 24 million Americans unemployed or underemployed, 15 percent of our workforce, we must be aggressive about creating the millions of new jobs we desperately need. It is simply not acceptable that high school or college graduates are not able to find work as they try to begin their careers. It is horrific that millions of older workers, who were looking forward to secure retirements, find themselves unemployed and facing the possibility that they may never again have a job. One of the fastest ways to create jobs is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure - roads, bridges, railroads, airports, water systems, wastewater plants and aging schools. While we spend 2 percent of our GDP on infrastructure, China spends 9 percent and Europe spends 5 percent. We also need to make sure that Vermont and all of rural America gets the quality broadband and cell phone service that we deserve in order to be able to compete in the 21st century. When we rebuild and improve our infrastructure we not only create a significant number of jobs, we make our country more efficient and productive. I will continue to fight for a substantial federal investment in infrastructure. Another important way to create jobs - while we protect our environment, address global warming and prevent new wars - is to transform our energy system away from foreign oil and fossil fuels and into energy efficiency and sustainable energy. In Vermont, we already lead the country in energy efficiency, but much, much more can be done. We can create many new jobs weatherizing homes and buildings while, at the same time, we cut greenhouse gas emissions and save consumers money on their fuel bills. This is a win, win, win proposition. We must also be more aggressive in moving toward such job creating sustainable energy technologies as wind, solar, geothermal and biomass. When we talk about the economy and jobs, we cannot forget about the need for real Wall Street reform. After all, it was the outrageous behavior of Wall Street which caused this recession in the first place. Incredibly, after we bailed out the behemoth banks that were "too big to fail," three out of the four are now even bigger than before the financial crisis. Within the next several months I will be introducing legislation which would bring fundamental change to the Federal Reserve as well as the way that largest financial institutions in this country are run. While we focus on job creation and the economy, we cannot forget about some of the most vulnerable people in our country - the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor. As chairman of the Defending Social Security Caucus, I intend to do all that I can to protect Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and the needs of our veterans. Last but not least, this country faces a major deficit as a result of two wars that were not paid for, tax breaks for the rich, and reduced revenue because of the recession. The deficit crisis must be resolved but in a way that is fair to the middle class. As part of any deficit-reduction package, the wealthiest people in this country, many of whom are doing phenomenally well, must be asked to pay their fair share of taxes. We must also do away with the hundreds of billions in corporate loopholes that currently exist, which enable many large and profitable corporations to pay little or nothing in federal taxes.
Detroit's former Lee Plaza Hotel closed in the '90s. (photo: Marchand, Meffre /TIME) The Party’s over for America, the greed bubble fueled by excessive debt has finally burst. Its time to clean up the mess started by the Bush/Cheney administration, perpetuated by the Obama/Biden administration and which is now a deserted ballroom ~ strewn with broken dreams, broken promises and economic devastation
The Wall Street Journal recently reported on clandestine insider trading deals, where elected officials in Washington revealed key elements of legislation before passage, enabling financiers to turn huge profits. The National Defense Authorization Act, signed by President Obama, creates a legal grey area that could deny Americans due process rights. The same Congress that voted down creating millions of good-paying jobs for unemployed constituents without batting an eye, is the same one seriously considering censorship of the internet. Congress is well-deserving of its record low approval ratings. In early December, Congress attracted thousands of activists for Take Back the Capitol, a week-long protest that staged dozens of sit-ins in Congressional offices, and managed to shut down four blocks of K Street for an entire afternoon. That energy has persisted. On January 17th, the first day of the 2012 legislative session (and the 4-month anniversary of Occupy Wall Street), Occupy is aiming to mobilize hundreds of thousands in Washington. At Occupy Congress' 11 AM national General Assembly meeting, two solutions must be proposed - to rally behind Sen. Bernie Sanders' Saving American Democracy amendment as a state-by-state effort to undo corporate personhood, and to immediately gather huge numbers on the steps of the Supreme Court in protest of the Citizens United vs. FEC ruling. The corporate media's unkind, one-sided coverage of the Occupy movement has hurt our image, steering focus on our camps instead of our cause. The news cameras' heavy favoring of the inarticulate and the unwashed has encouraged and enabled mainstream America to alienate and tune out family, friends and neighbors standing against a corrupt corporatocracy. Syndicated columnists and network commentators constantly accuse us of lacking focus or direction. But, acting on these two solutions both solidifies the remaining resolve of the Occupy movement, and creates a winnable goal based on a central demand. Just as Grover Norquist's anti-tax pledge has become the rallying cry for conservatives at the federal and state levels, the Bernie Sanders anti-corporate personhood amendment can become a similar litmus test for all candidates who want support from the Occupy movement. Just as Virginia's Ken Cuccinelli is rallying conservative state attorneys general to fight healthcare reform, progressive AGs can similarly mount a state-by-state campaign to challenge the constitutionality of Citizens United. Want the Occupy vote? Sign the anti-corporate personhood pledge. Our constitution already makes it clear that no person may be owned by another person. Under that precedent, Wells Fargo would never have been allowed to acquire Wachovia. Newscorp, Disney, Viacom, CBS, Time Warner and GE wouldn't have been allowed to conquer the media. A proposal to stand behind the Sanders amendment, followed by mass arrests of thousands on the steps of the Supreme Court would be the perfect catalyst to a state-by-state movement focused on ending corporate personhood for good. When Occupiers return to their cities, they could continue by participating in Move to Amend's Occupy the Courts on January 20th. While Occupy has made great strides in influencing the public dialogue, there is still a troubling void where a central, unifying rallying cry should be. Social movements can't be powered by raw emotion forever. If we want to win, 2012 must be the year we occupy SCOTUS. For our conspiracy buffs, I refer the piece Jim Fetzer posted yesterday on cold fusion. We get another “oh.” Turns out that cold fusion was always real and those that said they “disproved it” actually rigged the tests because they were bribed.
The Hot Fusion International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) above has been a White Elephant What does this mean? Gasoline, natural gas, oil, all of it is worthless, no coal, no nuclear power, no more national debt, no unemployment, no more hunger, stupid stuff like that. That’s why cold fusion was killed and it can be totally and categorically proven.
The crooked “controlled” mainstream media took part. What was the outcome? Millions died who would be alive, civilization would have moved into a golden age 20 years ago and “money” as we know it would not be very important. There would be no national debts, no banking crises and several wars wouldn’t have happened. America would not need its military, not much of it, if most things people fight over are either free or too cheap to care about.
He had just put together a gasoline engine for XXXX (Japanese company) that had 130 BHP, had simple fuel injection and would average 100 miles per gallon were it put into a Civic sedan. A turbo-diesel version would run a Ford F-150 capable of pulling a 6000 pound load and run about 65 miles per gallon. These weren’t hybrids, no batteries or electric motors. Sitting next to these were several NASCAR engines in the “build” stage and some “Bonneville” candidates. Gasoline is worthless and we are drowning in oil. |
|
Repetition of doom? The 2012 date is based on the sudden demise of the Mayans, whose skulls are seen above
fter the swearing-in of the first Congress elected by unlimited corporate election spending, 2011 went down as the year Congress fiddled while America burned. Republicans and Democrats both took their turns engaging in their fair part of naked corruption. 
No comments:
Post a Comment