Counting the days until world ends

WILL THERE be a sunrise six months from today?

Will there even be a day six months from today?

For more than five years now, I have been counting down toward Dec. 21, 2012, the day the world is supposed to end.

Now we are closing in on that critical moment when, according to experts, the Mayan calendar draws to a close.

Dec. 21 is the end of the Mayan “long count” and what happens after that is uncertain.

Does a new calendar begin or, as doomsday prognosticators predict, does the world come to an end?

We might have found out had not the Spanish conquistadors all but decimated the Mayan culture and destroyed most of their historical writings, which the Catholic Church declared to be heresy.

So now we don’t know what will happen. Now all we can do is wait. And time is getting short.

There are those who say that the 16th-century French soothsayer Nostradamus also predicted that the world would end on Dec. 21 of this year.

The problem with Nostradamus’ writings, however, is that they are so vague that his followers usually don’t claim that he predicted a catastrophic event until after one occurs.

According to other “experts,” the Indian tribes of the American Southwest also predicted Dec. 21 to be the end of time.

Those who believe in extraterrestrial life contend that aliens from space have been visiting Earth for thousands of years and these advanced creatures from outer space told the ancient cultures that time would end on Dec. 21, 2012.

That theory, like all the others, is hard to prove.

If the world does end on Dec. 21, how will it occur? Will there be a nuclear war? Will a great plague wipe us all out? Will an asteroid or a comet strike earth?

If the world is going to end in a single day, I think we can rule out these types of disasters. It would take longer than 24 hours for any of the above to get us all.

Some have suggested that the fact that our sun will be in direct alignment with the center of our Milky Way galaxy on Dec. 21 has catastrophic overtones.

Others say that on that day we will be sucked into a black hole and pulled apart like Silly Putty. Or perhaps the sun will explode.

If the Earth is going to be destroyed in a single day, I’d put my money on the last two events. They would definitely do the job.

There is another possibility, however. Suppose the Mayan “long count” simply ends on the day when a wormhole opens and those space aliens from another planet or galaxy are scheduled to return.

Maybe E.T. just told the Mayans, “We’ll see you again on Dec. 21, 2012,” and the scribes of the Central American Indian culture wrote it (literally) in stone.

So we’re down to two scenarios: Either the world will end on Dec. 21 or it won’t. I know. That’s deep, but that’s about where we stand.

Six months from today, we may all be single atoms flowing down a black hole or humans facing the same problems we faced the day before.

As I have said before, the end of the world has been predicted many times before and nothing has happened yet. I’m betting nothing will happen this time either.

But if space aliens do return on Dec. 21, I want the first interview. Maybe that interview will be my column on Dec. 22.

Until then, may the force be with you.

Donnie Johnston:

djohnston@freelancestar.com

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