Apocalypse

[lbsf1]

Your view on it.
Will there be an end to the world?
If so how?
What would you do?

Discuss

 

[Dotini]

Dispensational Christians have a distinctive eschatological "end times" story to peddle. The Hindu believe the world is created and destroyed over and over again. The Mayan calendar calls for an end to an Earthly time cycle on December 21st, 2012. The slightly daffy scientist James Lovelock thinks humans will destroy Earth through overpopulation and pollution, and are too stupid to stop themselves. Some think the Sun will go nova and do the job for us. I think it's all BS, and we are stuck with this mudball we call Earth.

Earthly empires and whole civilizations come and go. Our turn will come. But it's useless, or silly, to speak of apocalypse now.

 

[Stevisiov]

Your view on it.
Will there be an end to the world?

At some point yes, but it depends on what you define as the earth, as a living breathing planet, yes it will die eventually.

If so how?

The are hundreds of ways it could go, but I would hedge my bets that humans are long gone before the rest of the earth dies.

What would you do?

Nothing, as I will most likely be dead before it happens. If it where to happen tomorrow, I would probably panic, but that's about all I could do, I can't see myself praying to be saved.

 

[DK]

Will there be an end to the world?

Yes, we'll get swallowed by the Sun in a few billion years. Earth will be unable to sustain life after around a billion years from now. Or Sarah Palin could be President of the U.S. (shock horror! ) and nuke us to oblivion, trying to get rid of China with a thousand nukes.

If so how?

I just outlined it there!

What would you do?

Run. Or if it's that thing with the Sun, I'd be dead, seeing as no human can live billions of years.

Discuss

Uh...what's with the smiley?

 

[Famine]

DThe Mayan calendar calls for an end to an Earthly time cycle on December 21st, 2012.

You're really going to regret saying this if and when Joey_D sees it.

I'll fill you in on the basics though. No it doesn't, it merely ticks over to the 13th Baktun from the 12th - 12.19.19.17.19 on 20th December. The Mayan long count runs out of numbers on 12th October 4772 (19.19.19.17.19), but the next day sees the start of the 1st Piktun - 1.0.0.0.0.0

Incidentally, lbsf1, did searching not reveal these threads?

 

[Dotini]

I never meant end to Earthly time itself, merely to a time cycle, much as in the ending of a day, month or year - all examples of cycles. I'm fully aware that the Mayans calculated time in very long cycles indeed. JoeyD can rest peacefully.

I looked at those other threads, and yes, they are there and ready to subsume this thread. Personally, I'm writing off GRB's as any threat.

 

[lbsf1]

Famine I typed in apocalypse and didn't find any threads titled that.

 

[Famine]

Dotini - in that respect, going from the 12th to the 13th Baktun is no more significant than going from 1999 to 2000. Same set of numbers, just the one at the beginning gets bigger - though it has to be said, people were predicting the apocalypse in 2000 since the 1300s.

999 to 1000 - and, in 8,000 years, 9999 to 10000 - would be much more significant, equal to the Mayan transition from 19.19.19.17.19 to 1.0.0.0.0.0.0

Famine I typed in apocalypse and didn't find any threads titled that.

Don't just search the titles. I searched this forum for any posts with "apocalypse" in, ordered by thread. And got every thread in this forum, ever, that has dealt with the end of the world.

 

[lbsf1]

Don't just search the titles. I searched this forum for any posts with "apocalypse" in, ordered by thread. And got every thread in this forum, ever, that has dealt with the end of the world.

Sorry I will in the future.

 

[Lizard]

i think the apocilypse is going to be in the form of ww3 and its going to start on 24th october this year

reason the south korean gp

now we all know that the north and south have been a bit hostile so if they are going to start fighting its going to be a missile then and there for 2 reasons
1. it will cause a lot of shock
2. it will kill thousands and posibly some famous people

then i predict it will turn into an all out war of nato v every comunist country in the world

call me a pesemist but thats what i believe might happen

 

[Joey D]

The Mayan calendar calls for an end to an Earthly time cycle on December 21st, 2012.

You're really going to regret saying this if and when Joey_D sees it.

Thanks Famine.

Any way the Mayan calendar does not call for an Earthly end. It's an end of one of the cycles in the calendar, it's no different the going from a Sunday to a Monday to start a new week. The Mayan calender doesn't end for 41,341,049,999,999,999,999,999,994,878 years...or there abouts.

Basically the media got a hold of this idea the Earth will end when the Mayan calender ends a cycle, blew it way out of proportion and now people seem to think it's actually going to happen without a good understanding of what it all means. I blame the Discovery Channel/History Channel personally since they have Apocalypse Week and air all these shows that have nut jobs saying the world's going to get hit by Nibiru, have the magnetics of the Earth flip flop, or just have something explode. My personal favourite is the Nibiru collision because the planet has a cool name.

i think the apocilypse is going to be in the form of ww3 and its going to start on 24th october this year

reason the south korean gp

You F1 people are funny, I highly doubt a World War would break out over an attack on a car race. If either North or South Korea were going to attack one another the first thing they would do is target a military installation. In war you want to knock out your enemy's weapons, not their entertainment venues.

 

[Lizard]

You F1 people are funny, I highly doubt a World War would break out over an attack on a car race. If either North or South Korea were going to attack one another the first thing they would do is target a military installation. In war you want to knock out your enemy's weapons, not their entertainment venues.

maybe but its the more likely than some mayan calenders predictions
anyhow i only think that because in my mind its the only feasable posiblilty not that i fully believe it will happen

 

[Joey D]

maybe but its the more likely than some mayan calenders predictions
anyhow i only think that because in my mind its the only feasable posiblilty not that i fully believe it will happen

Capital letters and periods, use them.

I'm trying to figure out how you possibly thought this up. Why would North Korean bomb a car race when South Korea has several military installations that would be far more detrimental to the country if they got hit? Pre-emptive strikes are just that, you destroy something so they enemy can't use it to destroy you.

And if North and South Korea decided to get into a pissing match, war would break out at the Korean DMZ.

 

[Dotini]

the magnetics of the Earth flip flop

This is an interesting possibility. It's happened many times before, if I'm not mistaken, although none in recorded human history. If the field took a protracted amount of time to rebuild in the opposite direction, then that would have consequences.

 

[lbsf1]

This is an interesting possibility. It's happened many times before, if I'm not mistaken, although none in recorded human history. If the field took a protracted amount of time to rebuild in the opposite direction, then that would have consequences.

If it did then wouldn't all planes crash because ther autopilots would stuff themselves up.

Other solutions that COULD happen are.
Metorids.
The explosion of yellowstone.

 

[Joey D]

If it did then wouldn't all planes crash because ther autopilots would stuff themselves up.

If the poles flipped why would that cause planes to fall out of the sky? They don't levitate with magnetic force.

Metorids.

These dudes?

 

[Public'sTwin]

If the poles flipped why would that cause planes to fall out of the sky? They don't levitate with magnetic force.

These dudes?

Too much of the KFC marjiwanna.

 

[DK]

These dudes?

You do know Samus is a chick, right?

 

[lbsf1]

Auto pilot would think you were flying in the wrong direction.

 

[Famine]

Auto pilot would think you were flying in the wrong direction.

Would that be auto-pilot which is guided by GPS signals coming from satellites in orbit 22,000 miles above it?

 

[lbsf1]

Ok good point. I thought it ran off the compass. I only remembered about the gps untill after I posted.
Me Stupid

 

[Dotini]

GPS signals coming from satellites in orbit 22,000 miles above

These sorts of signals would almost certainly not be available during a magnetic field reversal, since they normally operate well within Earth's protective magnetic sheath.

 

[Famine]

These sorts of signals would almost certainly not be available during a magnetic field reversal, since they normally operate well within Earth's protective magnetic sheath.

The latter is not a reason for the former.

In fact there is no reason for the former I can think of - the satellites are not requiring of a magnetic field to send or receive signals, nor remain in their position. They are, after all, geosynchronous, not magnetosynchronous.


It's also worth a note that "protective magnetic sheath" may well be an overstatement. Even a complete removal of the magnetosphere (which can't happen unless the core's eddy currents cease) wouldn't necessarily expose us to anything significant - the atmosphere is plenty thick enough to shield out radiation right up to extremely high energy stuff - in the Gigaelectronvolt range, and the induced magnetic field caused by the interaction between the Solar wind and our own ionosphere is enough to keep those out.

If a magnetic field reversal meant toxic radiation death, then the several times it has happened in geological record should preclude our very existence...

 

[Dotini]

In fact there is no reason for the former I can think of

At the outer edge of the "magnetosphere" (coined by Thomas Gold of Cornell in '59), or plasma sheath, Langmuir sheath, or whatever you call it, there is a boundary which deflects the "solar wind", accelerating past Earth at 400 to 700 km/sec. In 2005 a CME reached Earth in 30 minutes, going a quarter of the speed of light as it accelerated past. These are highly charged protons. It is surely a fair question to ask if our satellites are shielded against such bombardment that they are not normally subject to.

 

[Famine]

These are highly charged protons. It is surely a fair question to ask if our satellites are shielded against such bombardment that they are not normally subject to.

That assumes a complete collapse of the Earth's magnetic field which:

can't happen unless the core's eddy currents cease

Magnetic reversal will not lead to the loss of GPS.

 

[Dotini]

My simple understanding is that if a magnetic field reverses, there must be a phase in which it passes through "zero". Maybe I am wrong. If so, there surely will be laboratory examples of reversing magnetic fields that don't collapse on their way to polarity reversal.

We have already stipulatd that Earth's magnetic field has reversed several times in the distant past. So now it's merely a question of whether it reversed without also collapsing.

There are currently several places on Earth where the compass already points south. Perhaps a full reversal would be a complicated affair with reversal taking place piecemeal all over Earth, leaving the magnetic field weakened and confused, but still operating at some minimal level of protection.

 

[tfujiwara]

If the earth's magnetic field collapses, what would happen? World's biggest Microwave?

 

[Famine]

My simple understanding is that if a magnetic field reverses, there must be a phase in which it passes through "zero". Maybe I am wrong.

This is the problem with assuming - and it has been illustrated to countless generations of schoolchildren worldwide as such - that the Earth's magnetic field is like a bar magnet.

If you repolarise a magnet so that north is south and south is north, it does pass through a depolarised state briefly. But the Earth's magnetic field isn't a bar magnet and is generated by eddy currents in a moving mass of super-Curie temperature iron. As north becomes south and vice versa, over a period of a few thousand years, the poles merely drift. There's no way to tell which direction it'll drift, other than southwards/northwards. We could end up with magnetic poles in Mexico and Australia, or Angola and Hawaii, or anywhere. But it'll still be the same field.

As an illustrator, not all planets are as fortunate as us in having a north magnetic and geographic pole that approximately lined up. Uranus - which is very much the black sheep of the Solar System insofar as poles are concerned - has a north magnetic pole 60 degrees out from its north geographic (Uranographic? ) pole. Its south magnetic pole is about 25 degrees out from our north magnetic pole. Even odder, because it has a 100 degree axis tilt (the rotational axis - and north pole - actually points toward the sun) and rolls in the direction it orbits, the trailing edge of its magnetosphere isn't a smooth tail like ours, but a million mile corkscrew.

 

[Sureboss]

Auto pilot would think you were flying in the wrong direction.

Do you not trust Otto?

 

[GT Pro]

I thought I could ongoingly contribute to this thread, but after being completely unable to understand any further than 'post 28' I realise I won't be able to (despite having studied physics in the past, Famine's complex discussions elude my understanding).

Nonetheless, my simply summary is that:

Assuming one's world is defined as the geophysical space within which one can viably subsist for the duration of their lifespan (at 2010, for humans, this really means just the planet we call Earth)...

That Earth will cease to exist as a planet at some point in time is as close to as certain as possible and the most likely occurence of its ceasing, I believe, will be the product of human activities or the activities of whatever species may succeed them (e.g. nuclear warfare). If this, on the off-chance, does not occur then the destruction of the Sun as we know it (in particular, its implosion from red giant to dwarf or similar) will wipe it off the planetary map.

But then, perhaps a species will develop its technology so far - before the sun's dying off - that it will be able to transport our planet Earth to a safer location before it faces imminent destruction or apocalypse? To forever be able to do protect the Earth from events that can occur entirely at random, though, relies on odds that are infinitely small, obviously.