I personally have known about this Mayan end date since I was 10 years old and I am 27 now. I have done a lot of research on this topic, and there is one coincidence that really sells that something will happen on December 21st 2012, and what that is, is that is the exact same day the Earth aligns with the Sun, which aligns with the center of the Milky way galaxy, on the winter Solistice. The Mayans knew of this date before the invention of telescopes or anything, obviously a great deal of history and knowledge was passed down to them. It's just to much of a coincidence that they could of predicted this end date on such a rare cosmic alignment. Personally, I am a beleiver that human civilazation is far older than we think it is, and I beleive in some effect that this knowledge was passed down to the Mayans from decendants of people in the times of Atlantis. I beleive early civilazations had a deep knowledge of Earth cycles, and biological rythms. I hate when I read this stuff that ohh... on that day we will all be lifted to a higher conciousness, or the Earth will blow up, or its the End...I personally beleive that the Earth goes through cycles of purification, ice ages, water worlds, and who knows what else. Mabye this date is just the first day in one of those beginning cycles. But on the other hand it is interesting how there calender simply stops on that day"the cogs of there calender round stop" It would be really neat if we could go back in time and see what they knew. To bad the Spanish Conquistadors burned most of there records.

I personally don't believe any major ends or beginings will happen besides deaths, births and maybe a war or two. And of course, that's when the next presidential election is.

Jay Balcaitis wrote:will happen on December 21st 2012, and what that is, is that is the exact same day the Earth aligns with the Sun, which aligns with the center of the Milky way galaxy, on the winter Solistice.

Almost. In fact if you think about it the Earth, Sun and "centre" of the Milky Way align once a year every year in any case. Note that because the Ecliptic intersects the galactic equator about 6.5 degrees away (that's 13 solar diameters) from the intersection of the galactic meridian and equator, it's impossible for the Sun to lie precisely between us and the centre of the Milky Way.

The position of the Winter Solstice point on the Ecliptic (which moves around the Ecliptic at a rate of 1 degree every 72 years or so due to precession) has been getting closer and closer to the intersection of the Ecliptic and the galactic equator in the direction of the centre of the Milky Way over the last half-precessional cycle (approx 12,460 years).

It was in 1999 that the position of the Winter Solstice point lay directly on this intersection point.

Now the Mayans weren't using our definitions of galactic coordinates, but they were interested in the dark void in the Milky Way that is caused by a dust cloud between us and galactic centre - they viewed it as the womb of the sky. They were certainly aware of precession, and their calendar recognises our age as being the time when the Sun is reborn in the womb of the sky. Our settling on 2012 is due to fast-forwarding their current long count calendar based on a start date in 3114BC (by no means universally agreed).

There is, however, a particular other reason why our age is special in astronomical/precessional terms, and the noticing of this fact in the long distant past has spawned many mythologies and religions that have served to promulgate the knowledge down the millennia. When you notice it too, you'll laugh out loud.

Cheers
Simon

Simon wrote: (approx 12,460 years)

...typo, should have put 12,960 years.

S.

Jay Balcaitis wrote:. But on the other hand it is interesting how there calender simply stops on that day"the cogs of there calender round stop"

Is it more interesting than how my calendar simply stops on December 31st, and thats every bloody year!

Are all of you people crazy? I mean you have some interesting theroies man...I never thought any of these would catch my eye like they have. But If you would read the bible..THE ONE BOOK THAT ACTUALLY MATTERS!!! You would know that no one knows when the end of the world is. What made the Aztecs so special as to know when Armegedon comes. I honestly am excited to see what happens in the next 4 years. And at the end of this 4 years...if it's in deed the End of Dayz....I will look up and smile

catrinax27 wrote:no one knows when the end of the world is

It's not about the end of the world, it's all about the timing of a specific astronomical event that happens only once every precessional cycle.

The event itself has a symbolic significance, for those that can understand what it means, but it's not about armageddon.

Simon wrote:There is, however, a particular other reason why our age is special in astronomical/precessional terms, and the noticing of this fact in the long distant past has spawned many mythologies and religions that have served to promulgate the knowledge down the millennia. When you notice it too, you'll laugh out loud.

OK, I'll bite. What is it?

catrinax27 posted "But If you would read the bible..THE ONE BOOK THAT ACTUALLY MATTERS!!! You would know that no one knows when the end of the world is." If you would do some investigating as I have done for several years, you would find that the church openly admits to the omission of information found in the Bible. And if you look at the scriptures closely, you will find that Jesus states "no lie is of the truth". Lying by omission is still lying. Thus, the Bible cannot be considered to be 100% accurate. Also its interesting to note that the New Testament was based on the accounts of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Two of which are described, in the Bible, as being illiterate. Yet they were able to write their accounts of Jesus, quite well I might add, some 40 years after the alleged death of Christ. The scrolls used to assemble the New Testament were in fact written in Greek and date back to roughly 150 C.E.. How could someone illiterate, who spoke Arabic, write such well written accounts of events in Greek 120 years after the fact? Also, the scrolls were written anonymously. Again, The church decided what to put and what not to put and by whom it was written. With all that aside, the Bible actually does give an almost exact time of the last days when in Revelation it discusses the last 3 1/2 years of mans self rule on this planet. My whole point is that man has known for many thousands of years the fate of our planet but unable to disclose that information due to the nature of man. What would happen if we all knew the real truth? Chaos and anarchy. Why has our government deemed it necessary to make it a law for all television broadcasts be digital by Feb. '09? Gamma radiation from deep in the galactic center will not effect digital transmissions where as it will wipe out all analog signals. 6+ billion people would start asking questions why their tv quit working. Want the answers? Look up and you will see. "And when the Lamb opened the seventh seal,.....like a mountain of fire....and cast it upon the earth." It's coming and they knew it. We are all gonna see it from the front row.

Calthos wrote:OK, I'll bite. What is it?

In about 2080AD (give or take), then the Summer Solstice position of the Sun will be directly above Orion at the same time as Orion [see note] is at its highest culmination in this precessional cycle.

Essentially, after nearly 13 millennia of gradual rising, the only truly anthropomorphic constellation will finally be 'crowned' by the Sun at the moment of the Sun's greatest intensity during the year and Orion's greatest altitude this cycle.

It's 2080 'give or take' because it's tricky picking the instant when any particular star stops gaining in culmination altitude and starts to descend for the second half of the cycle. That's because of two reasons:

1) The year of the turning point is different for different stars and a particular significant point on the Ecliptic sharing the meridian.
2) From year to year around the turning point, the maximum altitude at culmination changes very slowly and it's difficult to be precise.

Note: I picked Betelgeuse + Summer Solstice point on the meridian and arrived at 2080 or thereabouts - if you pick Bellatrix + SS point you'll get a different (later) year, as the SS point will need to track a further several degrees westwards in order to share the meridian with Bellatrix. You could make arguments for picking Al Nitak or Al Nilam or any of the other stars in Orion, but choosing Betelgeuse gives the earliest date for the coincidence of positioning to occur.

I'm just working through what the mythological implications might be of an ancient people noticing such a thing would eventually happen, and they're quite interesting, if you're into that sort of thing... http://community.novacaster.com/showarticle.pl?id=8691;n=4001 is a starting point.