Consider the claim some have made that a wayward planet is lurking about the solar system, on a collision course with our planet, soon to alter life on the earth forever, if not end it entirely. So, in mankind’s endless astronomical surveys of the night sky, has a “Nibiru” or a “Planet X” been seen amongst the stars, hurtling towards us in a dance of interplanetary death and doom?
Not at all! Despite all our looking, no such object has ever been seen. According to Dr. David Morrison of NASA’s official “Ask an Astrobiologist” Web site, his organization “has received thousands of questions about Nibiru and 2012,” and the answer is plain: there is no such space object in sight. He says: “To an astronomer, persistent claims about a planet that is ‘nearby’ but ‘invisible’ are just plain silly.” Even more bluntly, he writes, “The purveyors of doom are promoting a hoax.”
America’s space agency has also weighed in on the possibility of a magnetic pole reversal and the consequences of such an event. The evidence of the earth’s crust and examinations of deep core samples taken from the ocean floor suggest that the earth has experienced pole reversals before—times when magnetic north and south have “switched sides.” However, none of these were associated with great destruction in any way: “The fossil record shows no drastic changes in plant or animal life… [T]here is nothing in the millions of years of geologic record to suggest that any of the 2012 doomsday scenarios connected to a pole reversal should be taken seriously” (“2012: Magnetic Pole Reversal Happens All the (Geologic) Time,” NASA.gov, November 30, 2011).