For Some Interesting Reading...

Unknown

Is that a good time to go fishing?

Mike T., Swampeast MO

...Google December 21, 2012

It's the end of the greatest cycle of time that the Ancient Mayans (who were obsessed with cycles) understood.

At 11:11 Universal Standard Time on that day, the earth and sun will be in essentially perfect alignment with the center of mass of the Milky Way Galaxy and at the time time crossing the equater of the Milky Way. Don't forget that most scientists now believe that a super-massive black hole lies at the center of every galaxy--including the ours, the Milky Way.

If some of the stories I'm reading are accurate, there will be an an especially amazing--and completely intentional--event at the Mayan Temple of the Sun.

Twice each year (on the solstices) the shadow of the Mayan winged serpent god moves down a set of steps leading into the pyramid. At the bottom of the stairs is a statue. On this date and right at that time however the winged serpent will make it all the way to the bottom of the stairs and a shaft of light will illuminate the face of the statue with the tail of the serpent pointed directly at the conjunction. Supposedly the Mayans thought this was the only time the "underworld" could directly communicate with the world above. Because the earth will be crossing the galactic equator our view of the Milky Way will be more and more from the "top" after having spent many thousands of years viewing it from the "bottom".

The "gloom and doom" people think this will be the end of the world.

The spiratualists think it will be the dawning of a new era of civilization.

Even traditional astronomers and scientists are rather amazed and many do believe that this time will be close to the peak of the next sunspot/solar flare cycle which is predicted to be the most active in decades.

Some fairly rational-sounding scientists believe there's a good chance that the sun will "flip its magnetic poles" (not terribly uncommon--it happened not too many years ago). Increasingly kooky-sounding scientists say it's possible the the earth will "flip its magnetic poles" as well. We know this has happened on earth before, but nobody seems to know what affect it has or how long it takes to occur.

The largest cycle of time the Myans understood was that of precession--the 26,000 some-odd years it takes for the earth to complete a "wobble" on its axis.

The calendar that "ends" on 12-21-2012 is however only one-fifth of that cycle having begun about 3,100 b.c. which curiously corresponds with striking advances in human civilization--in fact truly the dawn of "Old Kingdom" of Egypt. This "ending" however is also the end of the 5th cycle.

I don't go for the kooky stuff, but it sure gives me much greater appreciation of the wisdom of the ancients.

Unknown

is that a good

Is that a good time to go fishing?

Mike T., Swampeast MO

The more rational of the spiritualists say that the Mayans didn't believe a cataclysm would occur at that time on that date; instead they say the Mayans believed there was a 13-year period of transition on either side which began in 1999.

I [think] the 13-year period is the first cycle in their "long" calendar.

Their "short" calendar was based on the number 260 which curiously is 13 x 20.

Their "long-long" calendar was based on 5 cycles of the "long" calendar.

13, 20, 240 and 260 were all "special" numbers to the Mayans. The end of a "long" cycle is 13.0.0.0.0

Steve Ebels_3

Check Field & Stream

They will probably have a special edition of the solunar tables for that time period.

Steve Ebels_3

Saw something about that too

The History Channel had a show about that particular subject earlier this week. It included the hypothesis that the eart's magnetic poles could shift during or shortly after the crossing of the galactic equator. Theories range from having virtually no effect to the destruction of life as we know it. Some theorize that the earth itself would physically move on its axis bringing the Northern USA up where Northern Canada is, Alaska would rotate down toward Hawaii, Australia would be close to the south pole.........complete upheaval of all that we know in other words.

It was interesting to learn from that show that supposedly there is an ancient Chinese calender that also ends on the same exact date. It was developed before the Mayan calender and obviously in a completely different part of the world.

brucewo1b

Steve are you saying

That just maybe we should keeping all those oversized boiles now ;-)

Darrell

Kinda makes me wonder if the whole, "we started as cavemen and progressed onward and upward from there to become the highly advanced hominids that we are today" holds any water. Seems like as far back as we can find hard evidence without biased interpretation the men were men and smart too!

I'm not that old, just turned 47, and I've survived the predicted end of the world at least seven times. The nuclear holocaust. The Cold-War. The ice-age of the late sixties. Y2K. Global warming. And a couple of religious end times calculations. Not to mention the world cannot sustain the overburden of the population and the trash and sewage that we produce. I'll monitor the situation closely...


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Unknown

Thought...

"It was interesting to learn from that show that supposedly there is an ancient Chinese calender that also ends on the same exact date. It was developed before the Mayan calender and obviously in a completely different part of the world."

If you study ancient civilizations at all you'll find many seemingly mysterious parallels between those on opposite sides of the world. Why is that? One theory is that way back in time before we started branching out from the cradle of human life and were all collected together in the same spot we developed a lot of these ideas which then went with us and morphed a bit as we proceeded to migrate and populate the rest of the planet. I'd venture a guess that this particular end of the world scenario dates back farther than either calendar to pretty much the beginnings of civilization.

Unknown

Yes,

Prehistoric man was a LOT smarter than most would give him credit for today.

So are animals for that matter,,,

Chris_82

Nice awarness,...

But you might also want to look at the "analemma" concept and how that related to your topic. They were do-ing things that were not re-discovered till the 1800s.

As far as the magnetic issue, this took place in what is refered to as "geologic time." In other words the poles didn't switch during periods of time that any life was possable on earth. Well before the dinosaurs, well before that. The physics are actually very simple, great heat was required. And great heat precludes the possibility of any life.

As far as a "galactic center" there is no such thing, there is a equatorial plane, but this is referencing the universe from the earth, it is all a matter of perspective. As far as black holes it is a theory, you might want to work on your BS degree and read up on research methods and how theorys are just theories but the public media has a feild day with preverting this kind of stuff due to the complexities of understanding concepts which most people need a few years to understand. In other words some theories despite what Nova and the science channel indicate can-not be reduced to simple things without a through understanding of: Calculus, linear algabra, physics at the two year college level and a good grounding in chemistry as well. Worry more a bout global warming and the ever (exponential) decreasing supply of fish, this is more of a ceertianty that is downplayed in our society than mystical events.

CC.Rob_4

huh?

Earth's magnetic field has reversed many many times over the past 4.5 billion years. The reversals last anywhere from thousands to millions of years. The last one (Matuyama-Brunhes) was about 780,000 years ago. Hominids were pretty widely dispersed around then.

The sun's magnetic field reverses about every 11 years.

Dave_4

Crap. Does this mean I should be designing to a different HDD?

Unknown

Chris, it's pretty clear that something with a heck of a lot of gravity is at the center of the galaxy, or nothing would be spinning around it the way it is. I'm not sure what your claim that there isn't a galactic center is all about. The center itself is moving, but we are definitely in an orbit, and orbits are around something at... the center.

or maybe two things, but we'd know that by now if it were true. We can observe enough of the heavens and do enough math to figure out that trajectory if needed.

Mike T., Swampeast MO

The concept of a "galactic center", e.g. the center of mass of the Milky Way is perfectly acknowledged. Really no more abstract than something like the "population center" of a country.

Granted we only have indirect evidence of black holes (let alone the so-called "super massive black holes" that are believed to exist at the center of mass of all galaxies) but both are mainstream beliefs.

I didn't look up dates of known? suspected? magnetic pole reversals on earth, but my memory was that such had occurred--at least once--while higher life forms existed. Memory seems to have been confirmed by others who did look.

Am not trying to suggest that anything earth-shattering is going to occur; just that modern man often greatly underestimates the abilities of ancient man.

Chris_82

Agreed about the underestimation of past civilizations complexity and social structure. The latest one is that the Great pyramids did in fact have privies and they, the pyramids were made of poured concrete rather than chiseled and quarried blocks. However many writers here need to quote sources and avail themselves of an higher education before they rely on so much information garnered from the pages of the National Enquirer. I am sorry to offend anyone and raise issues that were settled at the time of Copernicus, err. Sorry Galileo, but even then they faced church heresy pressures to say the same things you guys are saying here. Recent research and the fact that core sampling has fixed the time periods of the pole reversal theory out there well before the advent of any life on the surface, sorry, and why do you want to debate this point? And also sorry but with great respect, your idea about how gravity and basic Newtonian mechanics works, is more than a little off. Siphons and whirlpools travel clockwise on the northern side of the world and despite being south of the equator an many occasions I can’t say with any reasonable certainty my business floated round the bowl in a counterclockwise direction. Perhaps Dan H., when he isn’t too busy “side wiping”, can take that long awaited trip to Australia. He can give us some firsthand reports, any friends of **** Smith care to help out? Do things really run counterclockwise in the southern hemisphere?

Unknown

Flush Watch...

One of the great ruses of the shipboard crossing of the equator ceremony is "flush watch". You take the uninitiated (Wog for short) and have them continously flush a toilet while watching for the very second the water starts to turn the other way thereby indicating the exact moment you have crossed the equator. Unfortunately it seems whirlpools on the scale of toilet flushing are too small for gravity to have any effect on the way they swirl and the direction is actually determined by the design of the toilet and which direction IT initiates flow. So, although I have no documentation to offer I do have an eyewitness account to the fact that our shipboard toilets swooshed the same way above as well as below the equator.

Kevin Pulver

MPF

> "It was interesting to learn from that show that

> supposedly there is an ancient Chinese calender

> that also ends on the same exact date. It was

> developed before the Mayan calender and obviously

> in a completely different part of the world."

> If you study ancient civilizations at all you'll

> find many seemingly mysterious parallels between

> those on opposite sides of the world. Why is

> that? One theory is that way back in time before

> we started branching out from the cradle of human

> life and were all collected together in the same

> spot we developed a lot of these ideas which then

> went with us and morphed a bit as we proceeded to

> migrate and populate the rest of the planet. I'd

> venture a guess that this particular end of the

> world scenario dates back farther than either

> calendar to pretty much the beginnings of

> civilization.



I'm banned from talking religion here, but on a historical note, check out the tower of Babel in the first book of the Bible. You are correct that man from all parts of the earth shared a lot of common ideas. Kevin

Kevin Pulver

MPF

I'm banned from talking religion here, but on a historical note, check out the tower of Babel in the first book of the Bible. You are correct that man from all parts of the earth shared a lot of common ideas. There are some really interesting books that show how much of the Genesis record is preserved in the Chinese pictographs they still write with today. (C.H. Kang and Ethel Nelson wrote one I believe.)
Kevin

CC.Rob_3

you're joking, right?

"Recent research and the fact that core sampling has fixed the time periods of the pole reversal theory out there well before the advent of any life on the surface, sorry, and why do you want to debate this point?"

Well, it's not debatable. Here's a geologic time scale
http://www.geosociety.org/science/timescale/timescl.pdf

Look at the column called "magnetic polarity." See all those black and white bands? Those are polarity (black is normal relative to today, white is reversed). It flops a lot. See all those references at the bottom? Those are the scientific literature that summarize the information in the chart. We have a pretty good understanding of the polarity reversals back to the Cretaceous/Jurassic. As an example of their utility, polarity reversals on the seafloor were important in confirming seafloor spreading (i.e, plate tectonics) back in the 50-60s. Maybe read this for some background
http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/developing.html

So polarity reversals happen, they have happened for probably all of earth's history, and we have a pretty good handle on when they've happened over the past 200 million years or so. That would include the last of the dinosaurs, the age of mammals, and of course the rise of humans over the past couple million years.