NASA Attempts To Assuage 2012 Fears

eldavojohn writes "The apocalyptic film 2012 has dominated the box office, taking in $65 million on opening weekend. But with all those uninformed eyeballs watching the film, NASA has found itself answering so many common questions that their Ask an Astrobiologist blog offers calming, professional reassurance that there is no planet Nibiru, nor will it collide with Earth (although I do recall a massive solar storm forecast). NASA's main site even offers a FAQ answering similar questions. NPR has more on NASA scientist David Morrison and his efforts to calm the ensuing public hysteria, but survivalists are already planning for the big one. Pretty funny, right? Not according to Morrison: 'I've had three from young people saying they were contemplating committing suicide. I've had two from women contemplating killing their children and themselves. I had one last week from a person who said, "I'm so scared, my only friend is my little dog. When should I put it to sleep so it won't suffer?" And I don't know how to answer those questions.'"

Comments

Wow.

[Overzeetop]

Just, wow.

Re:Wow.

[mofag]

I think that's what the suicide offers are for - to reduce the number of stupid people. Seems like a naturally self-correcting system to me. I say let it run its course. Next thing we will have 10foot disclaimers on the entrance to cinemas telling the dumb masses that its just pretend.

Re:Wow.

[Mr. Slippery]

I think that's what the suicide offers are for - to reduce the number of stupid people.

"Ignorant" is not the same as "stupid", and can be cured by means much less dramatic than death.

The problem is that we don't train people in the fine art of bullshit detection -- mostly because doing so would challenge mainstream religions, not to mention most American's understanding of their nation's history and place in the world. When you've got a culture where many people take ancient Hebrew creation myths as true and are not laughed at, it's no surprise that belief in the imminent destruction of Earth by collision with the rogue planet Nibiru will proliferate.

Re:Wow.

[TheRaven64]

I can't disagree, but in the case of the mother who was going to kill herself and her children, I can't help thinking that just being related to someone that stupid shouldn't be a capital offence...

Re:Wow.

[Toonol]

You think the Amish are stupid? I'm not sure there's any justification for that belief.

Re:Wow.

[icebike]

"Ignorant" is not the same as "stupid", and can be cured by means much less dramatic than death.

In this case it is exactly the same.

These reports did not come from some long overlooked rainforest tribe, but rather from people intelligent enough to call NASA with worries and fears. These are people able to read or at least watch TV news, or surf the net.

Yet they can't distinguish between a movie trailer and real life.

That, my friend, is not ignorant, but rather, stupid, in bold type, writ large.

The chance of educating these people is slim to none. The recidivism rate of stupidity is astoundingly high. The success stories few and fleeting.

No one wants to wake up on December 24th to watch their dim witted neighbor's body being carried from the next apartment due to hysteria induced suicide.

But by the same token, no one wants to hand-hold these people thru every motion picture release based on a misinterpretation of a calendar developed by people who never invented the wheel and who's year had only 360 days.
   

Re:Wow.

[timeOday]

The problem is that we don't train people in the fine art of bullshit detection

99.99% of Christians are not going to fear Nibiru after watching 2012, so it's only fair to distinguish between them and the people Morrison is talking about. You must realize, he is fielding questions from a population of millions of people, some significant percentage of whom are literally psychotic (which actually means losing touch with reality, not being an axe murderer). This "idiocracy" meme (that the masses are stupid and we are the smart ones) is just ego stroking - don't feel good just because you're more sane than the bottom 0.001% who are off their meds.

Re:Wow.

[Temujin_12]

Just tell them there is no mention of Nibiru in the Bible

I did that, but apparently theres a mention of a "star called wormwood which will fall into the sea"

[facepalm]

I agree.

[facepalm].

The problem is that we don't train people in the fine art of bullshit detection -- mostly because doing so would challenge mainstream religions

"The problem is that we don't train people in the fine art of critical thinking -- mostly because doing so would challenge the intellectually lazy's of mainstream religions"

As a Christian, I frequently mentally (and sometimes physically) [facepalm] when talking with other religious people.

    -Young earth creationists

    -Militant anti-evolutionists

    -God gave us the earth so anything we do to it must be His will

    -That person doesn't believe the same things as me so they must be going to hell

    -That person sins, so I'm justified in hating/judging/ostracizing them

    -etc. etc. etc.

These aren't the markings of a religious person or mainstream religion in general and it is dishonest to attribute these kinds of things to everyone who is religious . These are merely are the markings of those who have failed to have an open mind and apply reason and logic to their faith. These kinds of people are more concerned about being right than what's right. And what's more condemning to them is that they are more concerned about being right than they are in following the core tenants of their faith to show charity and compassion towards their fellow men.

On the flip side, what further bruises my forehead is when I see a person or group of people who have faith in God do adjust their beliefs to new evidence they see while still holding on to elements of their faith they see as still consistent with that evidence and they are ridiculed for doing so by others claiming to be critical thinkers. Why would such a person attack the essence of the scientific method, namely the adjustment of theories against evidence? The answer is too often that, although they'd like to think otherwise, those who attack people simply for having (or not having) faith in God fear what they don't understand and thus feel the need to tear down it. It's our nasty primal instinct kicking in. Take away the fear and replace it empathy and understanding of why people choose (or don't choose) to have faith in God, and the desire to attack, belittle, or demean will go away on both sides.

It's easy

[DanTheStone]

You respond with, "It's only a movie. The world isn't ending. Don't kill your children, your pets, or yourself."

How this scam works

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

1. First buy a lots of call options of thinly traded mundane non volatile stock of canned goods and survival/camping gear purveyors.

2. Create a hysteria and panic about the world ending due to Y2K or Planet Nibiru or Mayan Calender cycle ending or Banks collapsing or Obama winning the elections.

3. ...

4. Stock of survivalgears_are_us.com zooms up and ..... profit!

Re:How this scam works

[StikyPad]

The joke will be on them when they discover the value of real estate in 2013.

oh, please!

[macbeth66]

I've had two from women contemplating killing their children and themselves

You tell them to come in, explaining that you have a secret rocket that will take some of us off of this planet. When they arrive, you have social services take the kids away and the police can take her to the nearest asylum for the criminally insane.

Re:Easy strawmen to knock off?..

[Ian Alexander]

Because taxpayers are contemplating suicide over this 2012 nonsense?

When should I kill myself?

[vanyel]

Before you breed...

Re:Easy strawmen to knock off?..

[eldavojohn]

Why is the taxpayer's money being spent on this nonsense? What's next? Scientific evidence, that there is no Santa Claus? That black cats crossing your path do not cause "bad luck" (whatever that is)?

It's a blog post and a FAQ. That's it. No probe to prove there is no planet Nibiru, no expensive mission. Are you really worried that one man probably spent a few days writing this up?

Frankly, I thought it was nice to hear that a NASA scientist is working to take the time to respond to a worried public and trying to minimize that time by having an informative page. When I was a kid, I wrote to NASA from Minnesota all the time. Every single time they responded. I still have fact sheets on all of their shuttle craft in my parent's closet. I read those things over and over trying to imagine how someone could come up with such amazing machines. Go ahead, spend a few minutes to hand write them a letter, you might be surprised with the response:

Ask NASA

Public Communications Office
NASA Headquarters
Suite 5K39
Washington, DC 20546-0001
(202) 358-0001 (Office)
(202) 358-4338 (Fax)

And if you came here to complain that NASA wastes tax payer money, you're in the wrong place. NASA's budget is about half of one percent of the Federal budget--don't even get me started on what our defense budget comes out to be. That's a ridiculously low amount of money for an agency that's charged with a major component of our future and probably the whole future of the Earth and its inhabitants.

Your subject confuses me further ... what exactly are you implying these questions and blog are strawmen for?

This is part of NASA's purvey.

[Jack9]

Ignorance is not stupidity. NASA has addressed the ignorance. Good for them.

Re:Let them kill themselves

[mcgrew]

And remove themselves from the gene pool.

Almost no stupidity or suicidal tendancies are hereditary. Most mental disabilities are caused by accident or disease. A very large number of children are born every day with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome to (other then being alcoholics) perfectly sane, normal, intelligent people. The "Darwin Award" is pure bullshit; evolution doesn't work like that.

If a stupid woman has fifteen kids and ten die, and you have never had sex, she won the Darwin game and you are its loser.

Not stupid, just scared

[darthwader]

Lots of people have commented on how incredibly stupid these people are. I don't think it's quite that simple.

I think that they're just scared. There's so much fear in our culture, people are scared of health care, scared of a black president, scared of terrorists, scared of oil prices, scared of cell phone companies, scared of pirates (the Somalian kind), scared of pirates (the MPAA kind), scared of the RIAA and MPAA, scared of swine flu, scared of unemployment, scared of having a job that doesn't pay a living wage, scared of peanuts, scared of global warming, scared of pollution, scared of home invasions, scared of floods, earthquakes and fires, scared of nuts with guns, scared of the government taking away everyone's guns.

Fear makes you irrational. It suppresses the "carefully think about the situation" part of your brain, and supercharges the "fight or flight" part. If people stopped to think rationally about it, they would realize it is fiction. But the fear prevents them from thinking rationally.

We live in a constant state of fear, and our culture (or our media, depending on how you look at it) keeps giving us more reasons to be afraid.

What we need is more reason to be hopeful, not fearful. If we remove the irrational fears about health care, presidents, terrorists, MPAA, pirates, global warming, etc., then we would also have fewer irrational fears about the planet Nimbus crashing into Earth on December 21st, 2012.