Starship Asterisk*

Moonlady wrote:2012 can not be the end of the world because my cookies are best before 2013 :mrgreen:

Even if the world meets huge destruction in 2012, we know that rats and cockroaches will survive, and they love cookies. So one way or another, your cookies will be appreciated in 2013.

Moonlady, just what kind of cookies are you talking about?

Beyond wrote:
Moonlady, just what kind of cookies are you talking about?

All board cookies will be deleted on Dec. 21, 2012.

Dr. Feynman talks about the three books that have survived from the Mayan culture. One of them describes how they predicted a particular astromical event, whether Venus will rise in the morning or evening. They dropped one nut into a pot every day. When they had 365 nuts, they would empty the day pot and drop a nut into the year pot. Then they noticed that during a period of eight years Venus rose in the morning 5 times. They had no idea why, they just knew the number of nuts in a pot, very accurately, with corrections for the fact that a year is not precisely 365 days (I guess they kept a leap-year pot, after four cycles of 365 they had to wait until the next day to have 366 nuts before they emptied it and added another nut to the year pot). Same with their calendar. When they got to the end of the calendar to which the over-anxious doomsday folks attach so much significance, they empty that pot add a nut to the pot that keeps track of how many calendar cycles they counted, empty the calendar pot and start over. If you have a calendar with a page for each month, this morning you had to change it from April to May. Big deal?
Oh, but lookee here at the astronomical alignment. Well, if they had been payting attention, they'd know that the same alignment occurs on a regular basis and every time it occurs, nothing extraordinary happens. The entire Solar System makes one orbit around the galactic center roughly every 225 - 250 million years; there have been 18-20 such trips around the center of the Milky Way galaxy since it formed. This December alignment has occurred before, but as far as anyone can tell, nothing particulary wacky ocurred when it did. Lessee, how many pocky-clips doomsday prophets have been proven wrong in the past couple of thousand years? I don't know the number, but I guarantee that each and every one of them failed to predict anything of significance, yet nobody seems to notice, there are no headlines, no movies made about the non-event.

http://www.vega.org.uk/video/subseries/8
http://www.vega.org.uk/video/programme/45 - 26:30

I cannot explain why formal logic is not a required course in high school. Perhaps it is because our entire economy is based up the use of logical fallacies to get folks to buy one particular brand of identical products instead of another? Politicians would find it difficult to get re-elected if voters easily recognized the fallacious arguments of their campaign advertisements. But I digress.
http://www.theskepticsguide.org/resourc ... acies.aspx

Psnarf wrote:The entire Solar System makes one orbit around the galactic center roughly every 225 - 250 million years; there have been 18-20 such trips around the center of the Milky Way galaxy since it formed. This December alignment has occurred before, but as far as anyone can tell, nothing particulary wacky ocurred when it did.

What alignment are you talking about here? There is no special galactic alignment occurring in December (although I agree with you that it would be meaningless if there were any actual alignment).

neufer wrote:

Beyond wrote:
Moonlady, just what kind of cookies are you talking about?

All board cookies will be deleted on Dec. 21, 2012.

I delete my wheat-chocolate cookies myself ...since board cookies are not edible... I don't care

Well, the cookies may be deleted on December 21, 2012, but I have oat flakes that also don't expire until 2013!

Ann

Chris Peterson wrote:

Psnarf wrote:The entire Solar System makes one orbit around the galactic center roughly every 225 - 250 million years; there have been 18-20 such trips around the center of the Milky Way galaxy since it formed. This December alignment has occurred before, but as far as anyone can tell, nothing particulary wacky ocurred when it did.

What alignment are you talking about here? There is no special galactic alignment occurring in December (although I agree with you that it would be meaningless if there were any actual alignment).

Exactly. What are we aligned with? The galaxy? The center of the galaxy? How can we be aligned with them on December 21, 2012 if we are not aligned with them today?

Of course it is possible to draw a straight line from the center of the galaxy to the Earth, or at least it would be possible to do it if we were cosmic giants who could reach from the center of the Milky Way to the Earth. Certainly, at least, there is a shortest route from the center of the Milky Way to the Earth. What does it matter that there is?

Ann

Moonlady wrote:
I delete my wheat-chocolate cookies myself ...since board cookies are not edible... I don't care

http://www.azteccalendar.com/?day=21&month=12&year=2012 wrote:
<<In the Maya calendar the Long Count date 13.0.0.0.0 [on Dec.21, 2012] strongly signifies a new beginning.

According to the Maya, the end of the previous world and the start of our current era was on a day 4-Flower with the Long Count date 13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.0.0.0.0 [~ 28 octillion years ].

Falling on the winter solstice, the start of the return of the summer, further emphasizes the quality of a new beginning. The thirteen day period (trecena) that starts with day 1-Ollin (Movement) is ruled by Tlazolteotl. This trecena is governed by the goddess of cotton and weaving, of sexuality and childbirth, she who is the eater of sins: it is the sign of the Scavenger, who feeds not on power but on the ills that darken [i.e., chocolate] the heart.

The rainbow serpent [i.e., neufer], symbol of pleasure and folly, levitates amidst a shroud of smoke and shadow: these are 13 days of stolen secrets and odd twists of fate. The earth itself shakes: the ills created by shock can sometimes only be cured by greater shock. These are good days for self-purification; bad days for self-gratification.>>

@ Neufer... as long as my chocolate is Fair Trade, I am ok...

I have not tried Nutella yet!

Guest wrote:I have not tried Nutella yet!

A few days ago i read an articule about -Nutella- settling a lawsuit a mother brought against it because it wasn't as healthy as it's advertising suggests.
Apparently they will be changing their advertising somewhat. I think it's made in england. I was going to try it sometime, but i think i'll read the label first.

Beyond wrote:

Guest wrote:I have not tried Nutella yet!

A few days ago i read an articule about -Nutella- settling a lawsuit a mother brought against it because it wasn't as healthy as it's advertising suggests.
Apparently they will be changing their advertising somewhat. I think it's made in england. I was going to try it sometime, but i think i'll read the label first.

Did the mothe bought Nutella for her child under age of 18?

In Germany sweets like Nutella, Chocolate bars are advertised by grown-ups and for grown-ups, after parents sued the company.

Moonlady wrote:

Beyond wrote:

Guest wrote:I have not tried Nutella yet!

A few days ago i read an articule about -Nutella- settling a lawsuit a mother brought against it because it wasn't as healthy as it's advertising suggests.
Apparently they will be changing their advertising somewhat. I think it's made in england. I was going to try it sometime, but i think i'll read the label first.

Did the mothe bought Nutella for her child under age of 18?

In Germany sweets like Nutella, Chocolate bars are advertised by grown-ups and for grown-ups, after parents sued the company.

Here's the articule that i read. I don't think i'll bother with buying any. I'd rather have a raised, glazed, chocolate covered lemon filled donut.

http://www.ctv.ca/CTVNews/TopStories/20 ... it-120427/

IWhat alignment are you talking about here?
The gullible and/or easily confused claim that there is some sort of celestial alignment that will occur on the end day which will produce some sort of nebulous forces that will trigger the end. For the sake of brevity, I didn't elaborate, since the blathering twaddle of self-proclaimed omnicients staggers the imagination. I can't imagine how anyone could come up with such a ludicrous notion. To make matters worse, it's a moving target. When you refute one scenario, up pops another, much like that whack-a-mole game. If there were such an alignment scheduled for the December Spring Solstice (a lot of folks live south of the equator), it would have already occurred during at least one of the orbits around the galaxy.

Define a plane through the center of the Milky Way, jolly old Sol oscillates above and below that plane in its galactic orbit. How can Mayan astronomers, who can predict only events that re-occurred after they started dropping nuts or beans into pots, have a clue about what will happen at the end of their calendar? There was nobody around to drop objects representing the integer 'one' into piles or pots at the beginning of that calendar.

What I'd really like to see is public humiliation of these end-time prophets next January. They should be met with howls of derisive laughter. If you knew the world would end tomorrow, what would you do today?

Sew! howcome nobody noticed that rock the size of a bus which exploded over California as it approached? Spaceweather.com published appeals for anyone with pictures of the event to send them photos so someone can figure out the orbital parameters of that rock. I suppose such an event could re-occur in December, so I'm going shopping for a helmet just to be on the safe side.

Psnarf wrote:The gullible and/or easily confused claim that there is some sort of celestial alignment that will occur on the end day which will produce some sort of nebulous forces that will trigger the end. For the sake of brevity, I didn't elaborate, since the blathering twaddle of self-proclaimed omnicients staggers the imagination. I can't imagine how anyone could come up with such a ludicrous notion.

Right, but you did mention "alignment" in a way that made it sound like there actually will be some kind of galactic alignment in December. There won't be. So not only do we need to let people know that any actual alignment would be meaningless (for the reasons you've already given), but in this case, there isn't even an alignment occurring in the first place! This particular doomsday scenario is doubly stupid.

Psnarf wrote:
howcome nobody noticed that rock the size of a bus which exploded over California as it approached? Spaceweather.com published appeals for anyone with pictures of the event to send them photos so someone can figure out the orbital parameters of that rock.

We have only recently had a system in place capable (sometimes) of noticing a rock the size of a bus.

Final answer: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-18018343

Those suffering from excess anxiety and extreme gullibility are off by 7,000 years. Their prophets of doom are using a different counting cycle, one that begins again the day after the end of that cycle. We've got another 7000 years to get our act together.

The calendar doesn't end there ...

http://asterisk.apod.com/viewtopic.php? ... 21#p175321

bystander wrote:The calendar doesn't end there ...

http://asterisk.apod.com/viewtopic.php? ... 21#p175321

Like the bunny rabbit; just keeps going and going and going!

well the world won't end in 2012 as it was meant to end in 2011 and it never did that either and nutella definitely rocks:)

Mayan Notpocalypse
Slate Blogs | Bad Astronomy | 2012 Nov 27

Moonlady wrote:2012 can not be the end of the world because my cookies are best before 2013

You got more evidence?

It would seem to me that this could in face be proof to support the end of the world hypothesis.

Best enjoy them before 2013

Best after 2013 would be better

The End Is Nigh! After so long the end comes to us all! I haven't found that fountain of youth yet! When I do I'll share it with all!