World won’t end on December 21, 2012

You must have heard about the doomsday theory as how a rogue planet is going to crash into Earth on Friday (December 21, 2012) and kill us all?

Some people are fascinated, and sometimes frightened, by rumors of the Mayan end-of-the-world myth. According to the urban legend, the world will end when the Mayan calendar ends by next week.

The myth that the world will end in December 2012 started with claims that Nibiru, a supposed planet discovered by the Sumerians, is heading toward Earth.

According to the prophecy, doom may come in a variety of ways, but one key claim is that a 12^th planet in our solar system, called Nibiru and orbiting the sun every 3,600 years, will ram into the Earth and destroy it.

That theory has gained credence in certain quarters and has spawned a cottage industry of scammers offering survival kits and backyard bunkers.

Mr. Hudson, a Californian whose day job is to run a computer system for a manufacturing company, is leading a scientific insurgency against the Nibiru theory with a website, talks at schools and online chats with other experts to engage the believers.

The only way to convince some people, he decided, is to counter their fears with logical scientific arguments about why Nibiru is not nearby and is not, in fact, actually real.

Believers in the Nibiru collision myth tout photos and videos on the Internet that appear to show the planet. The great majority of the photos and videos show some feature near the Sun. Some proponents believe Nibiru has been hiding behind the Sun for the past several years.

The photos are secondary images of the Sun caused by internal reflections in the lens. Photographers know this effect as lens flare. Such images appear opposite the Sun, as if reflected across the image’s center. Lens flare is especially obvious in videos because as the camera moves, the false image dances about always exactly opposite the real image.

NASA has clearly debunked various end-of-the-world scenarios in an FAQ released Tuesday, refuting claims of magnetic shifts, interstellar alignments and wayward planets.

The space agency says Dec. 21 won’t be different from any other day, other than the 2012 winter solstice. That’s when the Earth’s orbit causes the sun to appear at its lowest point in the horizon, and marks the beginning of winter. I’m sure you already know what the fuss is about. So, be cool and enjoy the days to come.

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Posted by Web Desk on Dec 15 2012. Filed under World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.