Science vs. Doomsday 2012

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).

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