Post-apocalyptic Thoughts

Well, the end if the world came and went yesterday, but that might be – and I really did hear this once – because we’ve been reading the Mayan calendar wrong by a year and the end is not until winter solstice 2013. I think that one of the great secrets of any apocalyptic prediction is having a good backup date if the main date “fails”, or passes uneventfully. A good story for that backup date is also helpful. The story of the reading of the calendar being off by a year is a perfect backup date and story. It allows the doomsday prediction to continue, and provides a great excuse as to why it didn’t happen already.

Of course, there’s also the argument that sometime around 700 AD an emperor decided that he wanted to reign in the year 1000 AD, and so he just skipped 250 – 300 years to get there. There is actual basis to this theory. It has something to do with all architecture dating from 700 – 1000 AD being nearly identical, with progress happening on either side of that time period. Under this scenario, the Mayan calendar is still good for another, maybe, 300 years. Blasted history, made us all look bad. (In more ways than one.)

While I’ve not actually believed the hype around the end of the world, it has been fun to watch. It has also struck me how many different faces we can put on this impending doom. I’ve personally chosen Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy as my approach, but I’ve seen several others.

There is also the argument that this simply begins a new grand epoch, rather than indicating an end. If that’s the case, then we all have a lot of things to work on if we are to welcome in this new era.

Reset the doomsday clocks. There’s another apocalypse around the corner.

I hope that we at least figure out the answer to life, the universe and everything before then.