There’s a lot of talk these days about the possibility of the world coming to an end in the year 2012. Specifically, either on December 21st or 23rd. Personally, I haven’t paid much attention to it. I heard about the 2012 “doomsday” prophecy back when everyone was worrying about the year 2000. Maybe it helped that I’m a computer programmer (and even know a little COBOL) but I didn’t worry about the world ending that time, and I’m not worrying about it this time. I didn’t think anybody really did, but today I learned I was wrong.
I was visiting my Mother and she asked me what I thought about the whole “World ending in 2012″ deal. I told I didn’t think much of it at all. I heard about it ten years ago and never worried a bit about it. She doesn’t either, but she has a coworker who is seriously freaked out about it, citing all this scientific information she’s seen. And it hit me: There really are people who are worried about this. There are people who really do believe the world is going to end in 2012. Honestly, I hadn’t really considered that anyone would take any of this seriously, but there it was. Her coworker is absolutely frightened.
I seriously do not understand how anybody can believe this, especially after we survived Y2K unscathed. Remember all the hoopla surrounding that? People forget so quickly. And so we’re doomed to repeat the past it seems. Some people will be so convinced that the world is going to end in three years there will be no consoling them. I’m not well read on the issue, and I can’t create a convincing argument against the idea. I think the best words I can offer are those I found on Wikipedia’s page concerning the 2012 Doomsday prediction. This sentence sums it up pretty nicely:
The idea of a global event occurring in 2012 based on any interpretation of the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar is rejected as pseudoscience by the scientific community, and as misrepresentative of Maya history by Mayanist scholars.
There you have it. People have been interpreting history and its documents to meet their own ideas and aspirations for a long time, and this is no exception. Consider the Bible: how many different ways have the writings in it been interpreted, misrepresented and misconstrued? Too many to count. That is the problem when people seek authority in the words and teachings of others. We all interpret things differently. As Frederich Nietzsche put it, “In the end, nobody hears more out of things, including books, than he knows already.” It is all too easy for people to make very convincing arguments for their concepts of things under the veils of pseudoscientific and religious authority. And the problem with authority is that authority itself is granted by those who accept it. It means nothing beyond that.
Even if one does truly believe the world is going to end in December of 2012, then so what? That’s three years from now. The best thing you can do then is live the next three years as the best three years of your life. That’s more than enough time to mend broken relationships, make new ones, get in shape, see the world, earn a college degree, climb a mountain, and do many other worthwhile activities. You have three years! Make the most of it.
With that said, I don’t personally believe the world is going to end in 2012. It certainly may, but not because of the Mayan calendar or anyone’s misinterpretation of it. We cannot know these things, and to concern ourselves so much with them is a waste. The past and future do not exist but are only ideas and concepts. We are here right now, and right now we are alive and the world is still here. Make the most of it. You don’t know when it will end and you can’t. You could worry about the world ending in three years, and a month from now die in a car accident. What value would there have been then in worrying about the end of the world? Even if we could know it was coming for certain, we couldn’t change it. Make the most of your life everyday, and know that right now, you’re still here.
(Photo credit: flickr user sy parrish, used under CC license)