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"2012" a Miscalculation; Actual Calendar Ends 2220

Posted by samzenpus on from the lost-in-translation dept.

boombaard writes "News is spreading quickly here that scientists writing in a popular science periodical (Dutch) have debunked the 2012 date (google translation linked) featuring so prominently in doomsday predictions/speculation across the web. On 2012-12-21, the sun will appear where you would normally be able to see the 'galactic equator' of the Milky Way; an occurrence deemed special because it happens 'only' once every 25.800 years, on the winter solstice. However, even if you ignore the fact that there is no actual galactic equator, just an observed one, and that the visual effect is pretty much the same for an entire decade surrounding that date, there are major problems with the way the Maya Calendar is being read by doomsday prophets." I wonder what Amazon's return policy on a box full of 3 doomsday wolves shirts is?

114 of 600 comments (clear)

  1. Assuming... by tool462 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Assuming all the conspiracy theorists can be convinced it's true, at least this means I'll be dead before this idiocy crops up again.

    1. Re:Assuming... by Philip+K+Dickhead · · Score: 5, Funny

      Funny.

      According my reading of the calendar - it's right here on the wall, in my office - the whole thing goes tits-up, Dec 31, 2009!

      --
      "Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
    2. Re:Assuming... by Hojima · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Your post is incredibly relevant considering that the Mayan calendar simply starts over at that time rather than predicting the end. The Apocalyptic prediction from the calendar was simply speculation that arose from not knowing the language. There's not exactly a Mayan Rosetta Stone so even all that we know about the language is still premature.

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    3. Re:Assuming... by Hatta · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I was looking forward to saying "Told you so" on 12/22/2012. But they always find a way to weasel out of their crazy predictions.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    4. Re:Assuming... by Torodung · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yup. It's the Mayan Y2K bug. Good thing their calendar is based on mechanical circles. People discussing a 2012 apocalypse are discussing where a circle begins and ends.

    5. Re:Assuming... by AresTheImpaler · · Score: 2, Informative

      There's not exactly a Mayan Rosetta Stone so even all that we know about the language is still premature

      This is not entirely correct, as there are still Mayan speaking persons in south mexico. (I bet there's also several in Guatemala). By the way, I had a teacher in HS that has mayan blood in his veins. His brothers (that still live in mexico) published a mayan-spanish dictionary in the 90's.

    6. Re:Assuming... by gestalt_n_pepper · · Score: 5, Informative

      Nor did they disappear. Mayans can still be found on any day on the Yucatan peninsula selling hammocks, fixing cars, running banks, building roads and so on. A little tour outside of Merida will show you people still living in sturdy houses made entirely of native materials. The Mayans, although occupied, are still largely alive and well.

      --
      Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
    7. Re:Assuming... by jeffasselin · · Score: 4, Informative

      There are people that speak something that descends from the mayan language, correct. That doesn't help us much in deciphering the written version of the language in hieroglyphics.

      --
      If he explores all forms and substances Straight homeward to their symbol-essences; He shall not die.
    8. Re:Assuming... by Kozz · · Score: 5, Funny

      There's not exactly a Mayan Rosetta Stone so even all that we know about the language is still premature.

      Oh, I think that if you'd consulted Dr Daniel Jackson, you may have received a more informed opinion.

      --
      I only post comments when someone on the internet is wrong.
    9. Re:Assuming... by GlassHeart · · Score: 2, Informative

      There's not exactly a Mayan Rosetta Stone so even all that we know about the language is still premature.

      My understanding is that much of the Maya glyphs have been decoded. Check out the rather fascinating PBS program Cracking the Maya Code for details.

    10. Re:Assuming... by xmousex · · Score: 3, Funny

      your right thats exactly what just happened!!!! i wonder who's door she will walk through next!!

    11. Re:Assuming... by Monkeedude1212 · · Score: 4, Informative

      We can go ahead and blame the Spanish for that. There are only 3 books containing Mayan Text still around today, all the rest were burned because they could contain "Heresay" (No one bothered to translate. Burn first ask questions later).

      All of our calendars, even modern day ones, are just based off of Astrological occurences. We use 365 days for our Calendar because thats how long it takes the Earth to rotate around the sun. What if we decided to use different Stars and not the Sun?

      Well basically the Mayan Calendar does this - They just use alot positions of Constellations to determine where they are in their cycle.

      And as an educative side note: Without knowing yesterdays, todays, or tomorrows date, the current day of the week, Month of the year, or what year it currently is, one could still find out the date by simply measuring the stars position, and knowing the movement of the stars, and knowing what the sky looked like on ONE other night, and knowing the date that other night is occuring on. Time should be pretty precise too, as the stars move. It's fun to calculate what the sky will look like 3 months from now, and then see how accurate you are (with a bit of research)

    12. Re:Assuming... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      the mayan calendar, is actually a replacement calender, and 2012 is the year we replace our current one. this is due to the realization of galactic time. This is like an expansion pack, to the current reality perception. The calender will predict, galactic plasma integrations and the overall understanding of how the machine of the universe works, will cause a great awakening. This awakening to galactic time will also be accompanied by alien communications, animals telepathing with humans, and telepathic awakining worldwide. the effect of this will be almost total elimination for the need to have wars. Because wars are a result of limited communication, lies, deception, and hidden motives. This will no longer exist in the same way.

    13. Re:Assuming... by LandDolphin · · Score: 5, Funny

      It's fun to calculate what the sky will look like 3 months from now, and then see how accurate you are (with a bit of research)

      We must have different ideas of fun.

      --
      Spelling and Grammar errors have been added to this post for your enjoyment
    14. Re:Assuming... by adrenaline_junky · · Score: 4, Funny

      Uh-oh, this is going to be a big problem for the United States since our entire fiscal policy is to deficit spend and avoid really solving any problems until the planet explodes in 2012. It is going to be mighty embarrassing when the debt collectors come a knockin' in 2013. "There's nobody home, go away!"

    15. Re:Assuming... by Svartalf · · Score: 2, Funny

      Because we tend to worship corny things as well?

      --
      I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
    16. Re:Assuming... by ElectricTurtle · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I don't know about today, but even during the peak of Mayan civilization, estimates of literacy in their society by archaeologists and anthropologists was less than 5%. (IIRC)

      --
      I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
    17. Re:Assuming... by Chabil+Ha' · · Score: 5, Informative

      When the Spaniards arrived, all codices and other writings containing any Mayan text were destroyed. The only real surviving literary text survives as a Spanish translation of a book called the Popol Vu, "Governing Book", (I speak a Mayan dialect, Q'eqchi'). The Wikipedia article there translates it as "Book of the Mat", which is a correct literal translation, but loses any contextual meaning. The root word 'pop' is indeed 'mat', but 'popal' has reference to the chief governing body of the people.

      At any rate, to answer your question, all Mayan dialects have long since been Romanized, but it has only been in recent years (ten, perhaps) that efforts have been made to standardize the lithography across dialects.

      It is interesting to note that the Christian conversion of the Mayan people brought about some surprising abnormalities (or outright perversions) in the spoken language itself. Even amongst the most pure speakers of Mayan dialects, Spanish has left its indelible mark. Take for example the word for 'people' in Q'eqchi': kristiaan. Any Spanish speaker would recognize the transliteration of that word as 'cristiano'. Therefore, in a very subtle way, you are not a person or a group of people unless you are in fact Christian. Crazy, huh?

      --
      We're all hypocrites. We all have hidden parts, it's the contrast between them that make us more a hypocrite than others
    18. Re:Assuming... by CarpetShark · · Score: 3, Funny

      OK. In exactly which direction should I be pointing my telescope when things go "tits up"?

    19. Re:Assuming... by Firehed · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Most modern societies also worship corn - they just process the hell out of it first.

      --
      How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
    20. Re:Assuming... by Ihlosi · · Score: 3, Interesting
      We must have different ideas of fun.

      I think I know who has proven to be worthy of their geek card and who has to hand theirs in.

    21. Re:Assuming... by Chris+Burke · · Score: 3, Funny

      Look, I don't know about any apocalypse or anything. I just know 2220 is a long time to wait for the LHC to come online!

      --

      The enemies of Democracy are
    22. Re:Assuming... by Abreu · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Go to your local Walmart and count how many products contain "high fructose corn syrup"

      Now who's the corn-worshiping culture?

      --
      No sig for the moment.
    23. Re:Assuming... by Richy_T · · Score: 5, Funny

      I think it'd be reasonable to presume a modern day Mayan would be unable to communicate with an ancient Mayan due to generational changes in dialect and word-set

      Not to mention the whole "being dead" thing.

    24. Re:Assuming... by Clock+Nova · · Score: 3, Insightful

      "If a civilization is so fucking retarded that it worships an invisible man in the sky, then one can't really take their prediction of the end of the world seriously, don't you think?"

      There, fixed that for you, typos and all.

      --
      There they were, sitting in the van with all those dials, and the cat was dead. -V. Marchetti, CIA
    25. Re:Assuming... by lawpoop · · Score: 3, Insightful

      ...all the rest were burned because they could contain "Heresay"

      Heresy.

      (No one bothered to translate. Burn first ask questions later).

      I think it was a pretty safe assumption that Mayan texts weren't going to be talking about salvation through Christ and the Holy Roman church. I don't agree with the burnings, but I don't think the Spanish erred in assuming they were going to find heresy in the texts.

      --
      Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
      -- Pablo Picasso
    26. Re:Assuming... by lawpoop · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Well, that's a point, but I think it's a sort of naive affect that smart people put on to say that the Spanish conquistadors might have found something they would have considered valuable. Of course, we really want to read those documents and understand the Maya better. That doesn't mean that the conquistadors did ( though a few of them may have ). They just wanted gold, slaves, and other imperial resources -- they were interested in sharing or having a Thanksgiving dinner, they wanted to conquer and dominate. Burning the books was a conscious effort on their part to destroy Mayan culture. They didn't have any sociological or anthropological interests.

      --
      Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
      -- Pablo Picasso
    27. Re:Assuming... by buchner.johannes · · Score: 3, Informative

      And not the first circle, but the 13th: from http://skeptoid.com/episodes/4093

      Mayans had three calendars. They had a solar calendar that was 365 days long, and a ceremonial calendar that was 260 days long. These two calendars would synchronize every 52 years. To measure longer time periods, they developed the "long count" calendar, which expressed dates as a series of five numbers, each less than twenty; something like the way we measure minutes and seconds as a series of two numbers each less than sixty. And, just in case this might seem too simple, for some reason the second to last number was always less than eighteen. The first day in the Mayan long count calendar was expressed as 0.0.0.0.0, and by our calendar, this was August 11, 3114 BC. Every 144,000 days (or about every 395 years, which they called a baktun), the first number would increment, and a new baktun would start. Recall how we all got to enjoy the excitement on the millennium of watching the digital displays roll over from 12/31/1999 to 1/1/2000? Well, that's what's going to happen on December 21, 2012 to the Mayan calendar. It's going to roll over from 12.19.19.17.19 to 13.0.0.0.0, just as it has done each of the previous twelve baktuns. There's no archaeological or historical evidence that the Mayans themselves expected anything other than a New Year's Eve party to happen on this date: Claims that this rollover represents a Mayan prediction of the end of the world appear to be a modern pop-culture invention. It's true that the Mayan carvings of their calendar only depicted 13 baktuns, but what did you expect them to do? Carve an infinitely long calendar every time they wanted to express a date?

      --
      NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
    28. Re:Assuming... by lawpoop · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Another thing to consider is how "religious" people outside the western material world-view are. I bet if we had those documents, they would be chock full of references like "And Chak [the rain god] blessed the land and there was a great crop". This wasn't a religious text, but what they would consider a log of weather and harvest. The idea that a god brought rain was just how the world worked.

      And of course, since this is the record of an empire, every thing done and tax paid would have been for the glory of the King -- a divine person, as all royalty were until relatively recently, a direct decedent of primordial celestial beings, a God on Earth. Of course, this would have been heresy, to pay any honor and respect to Mayan Gods or Kings, because they conflicted with the European God[s] and Kings, who were the rightful rulers.

      --
      Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
      -- Pablo Picasso
    29. Re:Assuming... by siride · · Score: 3, Informative

      English is as old as any other language. If you are going to talk about when it split off from the other Germanic dialects, it probably did that before the Romance languages became non-trivially distinct from each other.

      For any Western European language that I can think of, sending speakers back 800 or 1000 years would result in unintelligibility. Italian and Spanish probably wouldn't be as bad as French and English, but those languages have changed a lot too, and certainly compared to Latin. Same thing with German and the Slavic Languages.

      The reason Chinese can still be read is because it is an ideographic system and the orthography is conservative. This is also why we can read Shakespeare and Chaucer, even though both sounded considerably different from Modern English. It's not that Chinese hasn't changed -- it's changed a lot -- but that the writing system hasn't.

      Your Greek example is also bad because Greek has undergone a great deal of phonetic change since the Classical Greek days (and there wasn't even one language called "Classical Greek" -- there were a variety of more and less mutually intelligible dialects) and some grammatical changes. It lost the dative case and significantly reduced the morphological distinctiveness of the case endings. The entire set of perfect tenses was built anew with auxiliary verbs. It also simplified the accent system to move away from a pitch-based accent and towards a stress-based accent. I can go on and on. It's definitely changed a great deal.

      But honestly, you can go and read Old English pretty easily if you take a short amount of time to go over how the letters are pronounced, a few of the correspondences in sounds between Old and Modern English and a quick run through of the fact that there are cases and other verb forms. It's not significantly different from Modern English, even though at first glance it looks insane. The biggest difference is probably vocabulary, but if you know German, you'll find that even that isn't too much of a hurdle.

    30. Re:Assuming... by monoqlith · · Score: 2, Funny

      Someone mod this funny.

    31. Re:Assuming... by jc42 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Yup. It's the Mayan Y2K bug. Good thing their calendar is based on mechanical circles. People discussing a 2012 apocalypse are discussing where a circle begins and ends.

      Pretty much. And it's even stupider than that.

      The 2012 date is when the Mayan base-20 calendar overflows from (as the common translation to decimal notation would say) 12.19.19.18.4 to 13.0.0.0.0. The 5-digit date is actually 3 years plus a 2-digit day withing the year; that's why that funny 18.4 is the end of a year. 18*20+4=364, which is the last day of the year if you start counting at zero as the Mayan calendar does. (They ignore the extra .24 day in the solar year, so their New Year day slowly drifts over the centuries.)

      Overflowing to 13.0.0.0.0 is sorta like our year overflowing to 2000/1/1, of course. But it's obviously not the end of the calendar; that will be at 19.19.19.18.4, some 2400 years later. And even then, the Mayan calendar doesn't really end. There are some old inscriptions implying that the 5-digit date was considered a truncation, and it should have 2 or more likely 3 more high-order digits. So people using the Mayan calendar will just have to stop dropping 3 digits, and use at least one more. So 19.19.19.18.4 will be followed by 1.0.0.0.0.0, which will look sorta cool on the stelae that will no doubt be erected to celebrate the occasion.

      Anyway, even with 5 digits for the year instead of 3, we have a few million years until the calendar runs out, and if 6 digits is the correct length, the Mayan calendar will probably outlive our species.

      Base 20 numbers do use a lot fewer digits than base 10, especially when you get to big numbers.

      --
      Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
    32. Re:Assuming... by VolciMaster · · Score: 2, Funny

      "Instant grits?
      No self respectin' Southerner uses instant grits. I take pride in my grits."

      --
      antipaucity
    33. Re:Assuming... by TangoMargarine · · Score: 2, Funny

      And added some chic God-hatin'. Now it's infinitely better!

      --
      Unity? Screw that: XFCE. Slashdot Beta? Screw that: SoylentNews. Australis? Screw that: Pale Moon. UX developers DIAF
    34. Re:Assuming... by dcw3 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "If a civilization is so fucking retarded that it worships an invisible man in the sky, then one can't really take their prediction of the end of the world seriously, don't you think?"

      This is insightful? The two have absolutely nothing to do with each other. There are plenty of people who are experts in one field, and complete morons in another (or every other). Just because they had a culture that had a faith that you find ignorant, doesn't make them "fucking retarded".

      Now, all that said, I personally have zero belief in any of this.

      --
      Just another day in Paradise
  2. No boom today... by denzacar · · Score: 5, Funny

    Boom tomorrow. There's always a boom tomorrow.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
    1. Re:No boom today... by Sponge+Bath · · Score: 2, Funny

      That's similar to what Popeye said when disguising himself with a wig on Goon Island:
      "Hair today, goon tomorrow."

    2. Re:No boom today... by sajuuk · · Score: 5, Informative

      No boom today. And Ivanova is God. Trust Ivanova, trust yourself. Everyone else, shoot em.

    3. Re:No boom today... by Viadd · · Score: 2, Funny

      On a totally unrelated note, NASA will try launching its new ARES X-1 rocket tomorrow.

  3. Actually... by Kirin+Fenrir · · Score: 5, Informative

    That's just what they want you to think.

    --
    Caffeine is my anti-drug!

    Duranin - A NWN2 Roleplaying Persistent World
    1. Re:Actually... by Akido37 · · Score: 3, Funny

      That's just what they want you to think.

      +5 Informative. I agree. It's good to know what they want me to think. Wait what?

    2. Re:Actually... by clone53421 · · Score: 4, Funny

      No... it's a meta-mod joke. Moderators will often mod clearly funny paranoia "insightful" or "informative" to add to the comic value.

      --
      Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
    3. Re:Actually... by Arthur+Grumbine · · Score: 5, Funny

      No... it's a meta-mod joke. Moderators will often mod clearly funny paranoia "insightful" or "informative" to add to the comic value.

      I've also heard of the mods giving Informative or Insightful posts a Funny mod - just to make you stop and wonder what the hell the joke was supposed to be.

      --
      Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
    4. Re:Actually... by keatonguy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Long story short, mods are pricks.

      --
      If you aren't angry, you aren't paying attention.
  4. Greeeeeat..... by Gorm+the+DBA · · Score: 4, Funny

    Now we're going to have to deal with a rehash of all of that "You shouldn't call it the Millennium Bug, the new Millennium doesn't start until 1/1/2001, morons" BS...

    1. Re:Greeeeeat..... by paiute · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Ah, the false millenium meme. Here is a play relative to that but set in 1900:

      http://www.scribd.com/doc/13330493/Double-Naught-A-Play-in-One-Act

      --
      If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
  5. 2220? by oldspewey · · Score: 5, Funny

    Does this mean we have to endure another round of shitty movies in 2217?

    --
    If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
    1. Re:2220? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Nope. The Sex and The City sequel comes out next spring.

    2. Re:2220? by Sebilrazen · · Score: 4, Funny

      Why not? We deal with a round of shitty movies every year anyway.

      --
      "There are no facts, only interpretations." --Friedrich Nietzsche.
    3. Re:2220? by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 5, Funny

      Does this mean we have to endure another round of shitty movies in 2217?

      Yes, of course you will. Why would you think 2217 would be different than any other year?

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    4. Re:2220? by Kirin+Fenrir · · Score: 4, Insightful

      District 9 was good this year!

      So was...um...

      ...and...uh...

      Well, District 9 was good this year.

      --
      Caffeine is my anti-drug!

      Duranin - A NWN2 Roleplaying Persistent World
  6. great by ionix5891 · · Score: 2, Funny

    now we are gonna get another terrible movie, and its gonna be called... "2020"

  7. From the virgin geeks - Thanks a lot! by NoYob · · Score: 5, Funny
    Just to pass this on (I'm married so I'm already doomed):

    On 2012-12-21, many geeks were about to have sex from the new agey women who believed that it was the last day of the Earth.

    --
    It's NOT me! It's the meds! I'm on 1000mg of Fukitol.
    1. Re:From the virgin geeks - Thanks a lot! by houghi · · Score: 4, Funny

      I can imagine the geek that found out that the date was wrong: "Mmm. Either I can have sex for the first time, or I can tell the whole world they are wrong."

      --
      Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  8. Revised JoCo lyrics? by Itninja · · Score: 2, Funny

    So now this song will go like this?:

    Now I'm [still] waiting for the big boom
    And it know where I'm [was] gonna be
    The big boom
    I'm always getting closer to
    The big boom
    And it will catch up to me
    The big boom

    --
    I judt got a nre Kinesis keybiartf so please excusr ant egregiou typos.
  9. Date divider by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Every 25.8 years? That doesn't seem so spectacular. All we have to do is add 25.8 to the last doomsday and we'll know for certain. Did the last doomsday happen in 1994 or 1986? I don't remember either being particularly bad, except maybe for the music.

    1. Re:Date divider by richdun · · Score: 2, Informative

      Probably an error in your European to American numerical translator - that should have been 25,800 years.

  10. Didn't RTFA by EkriirkE · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Have the past, current and this calculation all taken into account all the calendar changes made throughout history?

    --
    from 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
    to 45 2F 6E 40 3C DF 10 71 4E 41 DF AA 25 7D 31 3F
  11. Amateurs by whisper_jeff · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The Mayans were amateurs when it comes to doomsday calendars. We have a doomsday once every 365 days (except on leap years) when our calendar hits December 31.

    Oh. Wait. It's not doomsday? It's just the end of the calendar cycle? Oh. Maybe the Mayan calendar's ending is the same thing and not the end of the world...

    Yeah.

    1. Re:Amateurs by Snowgen · · Score: 2, Interesting

      We have a doomsday once every 365 days (except on leap years) when our calendar hits December 31.

      I'm just being pedantic, I know, but our calendar (the Gregorian calendar) actually has a cycle of 400 years. The most recent cycle transition was in year 2000 (which was a leap year when it otherwise wouldn't have been).

      Of course the rest of your comment is spot-on!

    2. Re:Amateurs by carp3_noct3m · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I, being the information junkie I am, have read fairly extensively into this whole thing and have found some interesting information. The key thing is that all the really crazies seem to latch on to things like this and give it a bad name. The Mayans did not predict the end of the world, only the end of an age. In their thinking, there are basically cosmic seasons in the form of every 25k years. Also in their viewpoint, all previous transitions of ages were relatively catastrophic, but by no means end of the world. On top of all this, there happen to be a lot of coincidences scientifically with the date. The primary ones I have seen are the alignment of the planets on the galactic plane, and the best theory I read was that the potential for magnetic changes on the sun could make it a flurry of activity or the opposite. Im no scientist, but I gleaned past the hype and saw some good facts that at the least are interesting. Regardless, its not the end of the world, but it is also not the completely ridiculous y2k idea either (y2k = no scientific basis).

      --
      "It's ok, I'm completely secure as long as my iron is off"
    3. Re:Amateurs by ozbird · · Score: 2, Informative

      The most recent cycle transition was in year 2000 (which was a leap year when it otherwise wouldn't have been).

      Just to be extra pedantic, the year 2000 was always going to be a leap year in the Gregorian calendar.

    4. Re:Amateurs by Eil · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Penn and Teller did an entire Bullshit episode on this. Basically, the conclusion was: The Mayans themselves never predicted any doomsday. At all. They couldn't even predict the annihilation of their own civilization, let alone the human race. Their descendants don't know anything about a supposed doomsday. The whole was something invented by some crackpot authors to sell books to and get attention from gullible people. Just like every other doomsday prophesy in history.

  12. Wrong diagnosis by ShiningSomething · · Score: 5, Insightful

    major problems with the way the Maya Calendar is being read by doomsday prophets

    When someone reads the Mayan Calendar and predicts the end of times... I don't think the date is the most important detail they got wrong.

    1. Re:Wrong diagnosis by rainmaestro · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Precisely. Hell, the *Mayans* didn't envision any doomsday scenarios. We don't even know for certain if the long count calendar cycles at 13 or 20 k'atuns (Mayan counting was base-20, though many scholars believe the calendar cycles after 13). Assuming 13, in Mayan culture the end of a cycle would be a major event, a time of celebration. Nothing in the archaeological record suggests they thought this world would end precisely 1 cycle after it began.

      All this nonsense is just another way to scam the gullible. These doomsday criers are worse than the Y2K nuts. At least Y2K had a grain of truth to it (the rollover *could* have caused problems if it hadn't been patched in time).

    2. Re:Wrong diagnosis by hrimhari · · Score: 2, Funny

      Wow! Base 20! So they also counted their toes?

      --
      http://dilbert.com/2010-12-13
    3. Re:Wrong diagnosis by jgtg32a · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yup, it was much warmer there so they could wear open toe sandals

  13. How do you debunk a myth? by captaindomon · · Score: 4, Informative

    Wait a minute, how do you "debunk" a myth or religious belief? The only way to "debunk" it is to wait until Dec 13th and then say, "See, the world didn't end afterall." Even that approach can run into problems with myths and religious beliefs "No, it DID happen, but it was a SPIRITUAL end to the world" etc. etc. This approach is the same as a religious leader "Proving" a scientific theorem based on revelation. These are different structures for argument, folks, and they can't be interchanged that way.

    --
    Just because I can hook a shark from a boat, I do no offer to wrestle it in the water.
    1. Re:How do you debunk a myth? by snkboarder · · Score: 2, Insightful

      In the interest of being unhelpful: What? You're justifying the fact that this end of the world date keeps jumping ahead a few years every few years so that we're in the shadow of a perpetual end of the world? Eventually the sun will burn out and it will be true...and technically they'll be correct, but not because they actually predicted anything, just because if you stand somewhere and say something long enough, in theory it will happen. I can stand outside all summer saying 'It's going to rain today" and then "just kidding, I meant tomorrow." Eventually fall will come and one day it will rain and then...I am a prophet by your logic since you can't mix religious nutbags with scientific fact, as that would disprove them. Instead we should coddle the weak-minded fools because one day, logically, they won't be completely wrong.

    2. Re:How do you debunk a myth? by brian0918 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Wait a minute, how do you "debunk" a myth or religious belief? The only way to "debunk" it is to wait until Dec 13th and then say, "See, the world didn't end afterall."

      Actually, even if the world does end on the predicted date, the prophesies are still not true. There's no basis for their claims, so they're arbitrary.

    3. Re:How do you debunk a myth? by jbezorg · · Score: 5, Funny

      In short, you can't reason someone out of something they were not reasoned into.

      ... that approach can run into problems with myths and religious beliefs "No, it DID happen, but it was a SPIRITUAL end to the world" ...

      That's when you make the sign of the Devil and tell them: "Glad to see you're still here. I'd like to be the first to officially welcome you to the team. I always enjoyed your work."

      --
      I've lost all my marbles except one & It's fun to test angular & centripetal acceleration in my skull
    4. Re:How do you debunk a myth? by Hurricane78 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      and then say, "See, the world didn't end afterall."

      You have no idea how that really works, do you? ^^
      I know how it works, because I was there. In the 80s. On a end-of-the world camp. With my mother.
      We sat in a tent, had a bonfire with kumbaja-singing, bongo drumming, ate out of a tajine... and when it was time, and nothing happened... ...people simply decided that they must have been wrong in their calculations, decided for a new future date, and continued what they always did.

      Schizophrenia (even the mild one, called superstition or religion) can't be healed by blatant in-you-face facts. Because schizophrenia is by definition a disease where you are detached from reality, and deduce everything from a inner reality.
      The reason is, that the outside world became too horrible to bear, without falling into a state close to brain death. It's a emergency state (that became constant).

      And the only help, is to again make reality more inviting and tempting than their inner world, and offer them a way out that lets them keep their self-respect. (E.g. by allowing them to say that they always did the right thing, and weren't crazy. But that now they do something even better than before.)

      As this is usually really hard, modern society has given up, or thinks that that human is not worth the effort, and just throws pills into them, so they get "out", but at the same time lose a important part of their personality, because of the brain-wide all-eradicating air fuel bombs that these pills are. (Lobotomy light, one could call them.)
      It's easy to fall into the circular reasoning, that a person is not worth that huge effort, because he is such a "worthless, crazy" person (, ...because he is ill, because nobody helps him out of it!!)!

      In terms of psychology, we're still in very dark ages. We see the light in the distance. But it's still a long way to go.

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
  14. My favorite thing about the 2012ers... by FlyingSquidStudios · · Score: 4, Informative
    The Mayans actually had dates carved into stylae which took place long, long after 2012. For example:

    For example, on the west panel at the Temple of Inscriptions in Palenque, a section of the text projects into the future to the 80th Calendar Round (CR) 'anniversary' of the famous Palenque ruler K'inich Janaab' Pakal's accession to the throne (Pakal's accession occurred on a Calendar Round date 5 Lamat 1 Mol, at Long Count 9.9.2.4.8 equivalent to 27 July 615 CE).[12] It does this by commencing with Pakal's birthdate 9.8.9.13.0 8 Ajaw 13 Pop (24 March 603 CE) and adding to it the Distance Number 10.11.10.5.8.[13] This calculation arrives at the 80th Calendar Round since his accession, a day that also has a CR date of 5 Lamat 1 Mol, but which lies over 4,000 years in the future from Pakal's time--the day 21 October in the year 4772. The inscription notes that this day would fall eight days after the completion of the 1st piktun [since the creation or zero date of the Long Count system], where the piktun is the next-highest order above the b'ak'tun in the Long Count. If the completion date of that piktun--13 October 4772--were to be written out in Long Count notation, it could be represented as 1.0.0.0.0.0. The 80th CR anniversary date, eight days later, would be 1.0.0.0.0.8 5 Lamat 1 Mol.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesoamerican_Long_Count_calendar#2012_and_the_Long_Count

    --
    http://twitter.com/OLDTELEGRAM
    1. Re:My favorite thing about the 2012ers... by VoxMagis · · Score: 5, Funny

      Whew - I'm glad you cleared THAT up!

      --
      -- I really need to bleed off some of this /. karma.
    2. Re:My favorite thing about the 2012ers... by FlyingSquidStudios · · Score: 4, Informative

      Okay, here's the short version: The Mayans didn't believe the end of the world would happen in 2012 or 2220 because they had a date carved into stone which would happen over 2000 years from now. It's THEIR calendar and even THEY didn't believe the end of the world nonsense.

      --
      http://twitter.com/OLDTELEGRAM
    3. Re:My favorite thing about the 2012ers... by oodaloop · · Score: 5, Funny

      Then, during the Third Reconciliation of the Last of the Meketrex Supplicants, they chose a new form for him, that of a giant Sloar! Many Shubs and Zuuls knew what it was to be roasted in the depths of a Sloar that day, I can tell you!

      --
      Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
    4. Re:My favorite thing about the 2012ers... by rnelsonee · · Score: 2, Interesting

      True - and it's almost the opposite of the end of the world scenario.

      The long count flip is only significant (other than being the largest rollover possible for the calendar) because that's how long the previous world existed. Mayans believed that gods didn't like their first three worlds (presumably because there were no Mayans to worship them) and took a good 13 baktun (or 5,000 years or so) to scrap them and start over each time.

      This date simply marks the time where this world lasts longer than the other world - it is not Doomsday, it's a celebration to revel in the fact the world is going to last so long.

  15. Oh thats good news by Zarf_is_with_you · · Score: 4, Funny


    My credit card will be paid off by then making Minimum payments.

    1. Re:Oh thats good news by EvanED · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Wait, why's that good news? Why bother to pay it off if the world's just going to end?

  16. Re:Slashdotted link by traycerb · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It's not another link to the original site, but in the NYT recently Errol Morris was researching an unrelated Civil War story, and one of the sources was David H. Kelly, who did major work deciphering the Mayan script. In passing Errol asked about the 2012 thing: http://morris.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/01/whose-father-was-he-part-four/

    --
    Relax. Have a muffin. Enjoy the show. --Slick, Sept 13th, 2007.
  17. the Discovery channel by Presto+Vivace · · Score: 4, Interesting

    has run a lot of dubious programming. This was one of the things they were actually pushing.

    1. Re:the Discovery channel by c6gunner · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Yep, they do have the occasional lunacy. I was rather disgusted when I saw them pimping the "crystal skulls" fraud. Still, they're nowhere near as bad as the History channel.

    2. Re:the Discovery channel by eln · · Score: 5, Informative

      Pretty much all of the so-called "educational" channels have degenerated into non-stop conspiracy factories, showing garbage like "Decoding the Da Vinci Code", Nostradamus prophecies, and nonsense about ghosts around the clock. The History Channel, which had already degenerated into the Hitler Channel, is now more like the "Conspiracies about Hitler and the Occult" channel. Discovery's entire family of networks is bad too...there's something seriously wrong when the most educational show a so-called educational channel has is Mythbusters.

    3. Re:the Discovery channel by Dahamma · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Wow, your post is of the few times Godwin's Law has been invoked for a valid point rather than a blatant troll...

    4. Re:the Discovery channel by mcsqueak · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Pretty much all of the so-called "educational" channels have degenerated into non-stop conspiracy factories

      Yeah, tell me about it. I don't give a rip about ghosts, demons, Jesus, or any of that other stuff. Give me science and engineering shows! Things like "Monster Machines", "Biggest Suspension Bridges Ever Constructed", "World's Largest Skyscrapers" etc. are at least mildly entertaining and teach me about something real and tangible that I didn't know much about before.

    5. Re:the Discovery channel by mcgrew · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It's sad, Discovery Channel used to be almost all about science. Now it seems to be all about pseudoscience. Still, the History Channel delves into that tripe as well, but they do actually have some history, too -- and science. There's a show called The Universe that's good, Wild West Tech was good (probably cancelled since Carridine died), there's Heavy metal, etc. There was a history of hillbillies yesterday, and there was an excellent show a few months ago about the history of beer.

      They were doing JFK today about noonish. Some tripe, but far more meat than Discovery.

      --
      Free Martian Whores!
    6. Re:the Discovery channel by NewbieProgrammerMan · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Wow, I never even thought about that (I was just going for the "what a stupid concept for a show" angle), but I don't doubt they hate it.

      Actually, maybe these shows provide some value to society: if you find yourself in a conversation with a member of $GROUP_X, all you have to do is bring up the $POPCULTURE_DEPICTION_OF_X show, and just agree with the almost guaranteed strong negative reaction. Nothing breaks the ice like a topic you can both get angry about. ;)

      --
      [b.belong('us') for b in bases if b.owner() == 'you']
    7. Re:the Discovery channel by ceoyoyo · · Score: 2, Informative

      It's excellent... when they're not showing programs about dog training or rescuing, which is about 5% of the time.

    8. Re:the Discovery channel by X3J11 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Wow, your post is of the few times Godwin's Law has been invoked for a valid point rather than a blatant troll...

      Godwin's Law (also known as Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies) is a humorous observation made by Mike Godwin in 1990 which has become an Internet adage. It states: "As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1." The term Godwin's law can also refer to the tradition that whoever makes such a comparison is said to "lose" the debate.

      One does not "invoke" Godwin's law, and no comparison to Nazis was made.

      Yes, I have too much spare time.

    9. Re:the Discovery channel by Dahamma · · Score: 3, Funny

      Jeez, what a Godwin's Law Nazi...

  18. Re:Damn by clone53421 · · Score: 4, Informative

    Sigh. As if they've never read or understood the verses in Mark 13:31, 32?

    Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

    There are plenty of other passages to the same effect. They've read them, of course. They just conveniently ignore them.

    --
    Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
  19. Just wait.. by Tibia1 · · Score: 2, Funny

    until they realized they have miscalculated it again, and they find the date to be less than the year 2000. Now that's going to be embarrassing.

  20. Nothing is simple anymore by gmuslera · · Score: 2, Insightful
    Not only you have to "predict" the end on the world (based on trusty facts like ancient calendars, weird math tricks, how mush grows, holy books, tea leaves and hand lines), but have to pick something flexible enough to show after the predicted time how you made a small mistake and will happen somewhat shortly after anyway (so, i.e. you dont have to return what has been "donated" to your church or something similar because all was ending). Is not the 1st time that the end of the world has been delayed. In Y2K some tough that was after Dec 31/99, but some of the scare survived till Dec 31/00. Jehovah’s Witnesses predicted that all will end in 1874, then 1878, 1881, 1910, 1914, 1918, 1925, 1975, and 1984.

    There are several lists of those Doomsday predictions, i.e. here

    1. Re:Nothing is simple anymore by Xtifr · · Score: 2, Interesting

      My favorite example of a prediction retroactively corrected (albeit more tongue-in-cheek than most) is the Subgenii, who, when the world didn't end in 1998, decided that they'd gotten the date upside down! The correct date, they now proclaim, is 8661. :)

      (Actually, they apparently now have end-of-world celebrations every year, just in case, but I remember when the 8661 date was on the front page of the Subgenius website, and that date is still commemorated in the ddate man page as above, and is mentioned in lots of related material.)

      Ironically, the page you linked to includes the original Subgenius date with no commentary on either the nature of Slack, er, Bob, er the CoSG, nor any mention of the updated 8661 date.

  21. What I found amazing... by Rei · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ...was that I got halfway through the article before I realized I was viewing it through Google Translate. Yeah, I wasn't paying much attention. And yeah, I had noticed some errors -- but my mind just dismissed them as poor proofreading before publishing. I'm still impressed by how far online translation services have come from the early days of AltaVista Babelfish.

    --
    It's a Cyrillic alphabet. It's like all those keys you never push on a calculator.
    1. Re:What I found amazing... by Rei · · Score: 4, Funny

      As an example, here's what *today's* Babelfish thinks of the article:

      To be fed up: ' 2012' is just over two centuries
      By: At Keulemans

      In the film 2012 that this month in premiere, fall the cities and continents go at small woods, if the world fares. Toch moan that research has shown exactly that it ' end of the tijden' of 21 December 2012 there probably clears two centuries beside zit.

      --
      It's a Cyrillic alphabet. It's like all those keys you never push on a calculator.
  22. Article wrong, GMT correlation not wrong by Xoc-S · · Score: 5, Informative
    The most commonly used correlation of the Gregorian Calendar and the Maya Calendar is the GMT correlation, after Goodwin, Martinez, Thompson, the main proponents. In this correlation, December 21, 2012 will be the end of the 13th Baktun. The only other correlation used by any but fringe scholars places the end of the 13th Baktun two days later on December 23rd. These guys are proposing a new correlation because of some reading of the Venus pages in the Dresden Codex. However. as has been known since at least the 1950s the Venus pages work exactly right with the GMT correlation, so these guys are just wrong about their correlation.

    The reason for all the hoopla about 2012, is that in the Maya Calendar, the last creation ended on a 13th Baktun. The lunatics suppose that since the last creation ended on a 13th Baktun, the Maya supposed that this creation would also end after 13 Baktuns, but there is no evidence that the Maya had any such beliefs. There is a date on the West Panel of the Temple of Inscriptions from Palenque that refers to an anniversary of the crowning of the king, Pacal, that makes it quite obvious that the Maya believed that there was a 14th through 20th Baktun.

    So, in summary, these guys are wrong about the new correlation, and all the 2012 nutjobs are wrong about even the Maya believing that 2012 was the end of this creation. For more information, see the presentation on the FAMSI (Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies) web site by Mark Van Stone that fully details what is known and what is true about Maya beliefs about 2012. http://www.famsi.org/research/vanstone/2012/index.html

  23. Re:Damn by tsm_sf · · Score: 3, Insightful

    They've read them, of course. They just conveniently ignore them.

    Well, why should that part of the bible be any different?

    --
    Literalism isn't a form of humor, it's you being irritating.
  24. Re:Damn by clone53421 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You say that as if they conveniently ignore the entire Bible. They don't, quite... they usually have a few passages that they conveniently claim to mean something that they don't really, then they repeat those parts over and over to drown out anyone who contradicts them.

    --
    Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
  25. Re:Its never going to stop.. by greywire · · Score: 2

    I think I'll setup a website where people can register their belief of when they think the end will come and what the signs will be, and then people can vote on which ones they agree with (or just find.. interesting). And maybe the top one will be shown on the home page with a countdown...

    --
    -- Senior Software Engineer, Attorney appearance services, locallawyerapp.com.
  26. Re:Damn by radtea · · Score: 4, Insightful

    they usually have a few passages that they conveniently claim to mean something that they don't really, then they repeat those parts over and over to drown out anyone who contradicts them.

    Almost everyone who calls themselves a "Christian" today does exactly this. They ignore all the contradictions, God-driven violence and slavery in the Old Testament, they ignore that Jesus said not one jot of the law would pass away, they ignore the prohibiition on divorce and remarriage, they ignore the contradictory accounts of the resurrection, they ignore Jesus' claim to have come to put the world to the sword...

    The bits they don't ignore entirely they interpret bizarrely, typically dropping the Jewish context and inserting thier own fantasies.

    It is unfortunately extremely difficult for people like this to even see the words on the page in front of them and interpret them as they would an ordinary text, which is all it is. The act of reading gets replaced by the act of interpretation, so that it is almost impossible for the person so aflicted to so much as consider the possibility that the words might have other meanings than the interpretation they are comfortable with.

    --
    Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
  27. Next Stop... The Y2K38 Bug by tunapez · · Score: 2, Funny

    This means I'll have to wait until 2038 when Linux time ends? Gonna be a bit harder to convince the chix with the crystals on that one. Would everyone please help curtail the x64 transition until then?

    K'thx!

    --
    Imagination drew in bold strokes, instantly serving hopes and fears, while knowledge advanced by slow increments...
  28. The science of bullshit by spaceyhackerlady · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The only science here is bullshit.

    They can't even get basic facts right. The so-called "alignment" is 6 degrees off, and happens twice a year.

    The last rollover of a b'akt'un cycle was in 1618. Did anybody notice?

    ...laura

  29. Why Did They Release This? by SwashbucklingCowboy · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Now we're going to have to listen to this nonsense for another 12 years.

  30. Whatever... by hackus · · Score: 2, Insightful

    As I see it, whenever a calendar marks the changing of an age and in particular the Mayan calendar which, make no mistake these stone agers knew their mathematics, I take pause.

    Secondly, I find it odd, all of a sudden now, after what 200 years of studying this calendar someone with "never before seen insight into Mayan calendar mathematics and observational astronomy" says "Woops, everyone goofed its actually XXXX."

    That is sort of like myself declaring, well...all of you guys thought Octover 27th was tomorrow, but I am smarter than you all, and everyone in the last 200 years that looked at the problem, and I say its 200 years from now.

    The mathematics has been beaten like a dead horse, and indeed the age ends on December 21st on the solstice marker.

    Now, I am not so sure anything dire is going to happen, but I do believe at the end of any age, its closing represents a judgement on the future path time will proceed.

    Be it good or bad, I hope humanity gets exactly what it deserves.

    -Hack

    --
    Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
  31. Mayan's were optimistic by 2gravey · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Wait why are we listening to Mayans again? The world already did end for them, a long long time ago. It seems that their prediction (if it even was one) was way optimistic.

  32. Re:Damn by clone53421 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Actually, I'd like to explain a bit more in depth on that. It's an interesting story.

    The Passover matzah is unleavened. It represents the bread which the Israelites took with them when they fled Egypt; in their haste they had no time to wait for bread to rise. Thus, unleavened bread.

    The wine is an icon of the blood which was sprinkled on the doorposts of Israelite homes so that the angel of death would pass over their homes and spare their first-born sons when the sons of the Egyptians were killed. It was sprinkled in three places, on either side and above the doorframe.

    The custom was for the youngest at the meal to sit next to the teacher or elder (who would be at the head of the table, wherever that was). The youngest would ask what each symbol meant, and the elder would explain it. This was to commemorate the Jews' escape from Egypt.

    Instead of following the standard script, Jesus said the bread was his body and the wine his blood. Then he completely changed the focus by saying they were to do it in remembrance of him – not the escape from Egypt! No doubt this caused a good deal of puzzlement in everyone present...

    Then Jesus was eventually crucified, and the blood on the cross matched up with blood on either side and above the doorway in the original plague in Egypt – tying the whole thing together and showing that it was a prophetic sign of Christ from the beginning.

    Even if you don't believe it, and I have no doubt you don't (and I'm not trying to convince anyone), it's a fascinating marriage between Judaism and Christianity. All the original Christians were Jews, remember.

    --
    Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
  33. Yes they ignored them by aepervius · · Score: 2

    Because those passage are about as bunk as the mayan end-of-the-word-in-2012, or about as bunk as Thor's legend, or whatever sumerian stuff or the impregnation as a shower of coin by Zeus (or whatever it was). Your bible is about as much a myth as the rest. the only difference is a lot more people believe in the myth. That does not make it more right.

    --
    C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
    http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
    visit randi.org
  34. Re:Actually we can read Mayan by Phrogman · · Score: 2, Informative

    According to Wikipedia at least:
    "Progress in decipherment continues at a rapid pace today, and it is generally agreed by scholars that over 90 percent of the Maya texts can now be read with reasonable accuracy."

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_script

    Its not as evolved as our understanding of Egyptian perhaps but its well on its way. As far as I recall the Mayan languages spoken by present day Maya have not changed a lot either and thus would be of substantial help in deciphering the scripts.

    --
    "The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
  35. obligatory by TRRosen · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Tonight were gonna party like its 2219?

  36. Damn it! by consumer_whore · · Score: 2, Funny

    They'll still being going on about this non-sense for years. I was looking forward to nothing happening, so in 2013 they could finally shut up.

  37. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 2, Funny

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  38. Re:Damn by Jason+Levine · · Score: 2, Informative

    Wine is never a symbol of blood in Judaism. It is always a symbol of joy and happiness. We spill drops of wine while reading the names of the ten plagues, not because blood was spilled during them, but because our happiness is diminished knowing that people had to die for us to get our freedom. The "blood sprinkled on the doorposts" is partially represented by the shank bone on the Sedar plate (lamb sacrifice which we no longer do) and partially by the mezuzahs on our doorposts.

    The idea that wine = blood in Judaism comes from Christian groups (to whom wine did represent the blood of Christ) and from the blood libels where Jews were accused of kidnapping kids, slaughtering them, and turning their blood into their (the Jews') wine. Of course, this is an outright lie. The truth of the matter is that Judaism forbids consuming blood. That is why kosher meat is salted and soaked (to remove any blood in it).

    --
    My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
  39. Re:Damn by clone53421 · · Score: 2, Informative

    Thanks for the correction. So basically Jesus totally re-appropriated the symbolism of wine and said it represented his blood.

    Reading the wiki on "Passover" further, there were 4 cups of wine, one of which represented the Exodus, which is the closest I can come to claiming my statement was anywhere close to being correct. The other three were various blessings and prayers.

    --
    Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.