NASA -- forever the nerd at the birthday party revealing secrets to magic tricks in painful detail -- continues to ruin our fun. The government organization is so confident the Mayan apocalypse won't happen on Dec. 21 it's already released a video to its official YouTube channel for the day after Armageddon entitled, "Why the World Didn't End Yesterday," NASA announced.
NASA had previously released a video earlier this year explaining why the Mayan calendar doesn't accurately predict the apocalypse, and that the myth that the planet "Nibiru" is heading toward Earth is easily disproved because astronomers have detected no such planet. But the organization has been so overwhelmed by apocalypse prophecies it felt the need to break it all down once again, even further.
"At least a once a week I get a message from a young person - as young as 11 - who says they are ill and/or contemplating suicide because of the coming doomsday," said David Morrison, a planetary astronomer and senior scientist for NASA who answers questions from the public about astrobiology, in an interview with Time.
"I think it was about 4 years ago, early in 2008, I started getting 5 questions a day about 2012, and now it has increased," said Morrison. "The most common question is, 'Will the world end on December 21, 2012?' I find that strange because the idea of the world ending is absurd. Do they really think, 'The world is ending, but if I build a bomb shelter in my back yard, I'll survive'?"
In the new video, NASA explains how the Mayan doomsday rumors began in the first place and focuses on the numerous misconceptions concerning the Dec. 21, 2012 end times date. For instance, if an asteroid really were on a collision course with Earth, we would already see it in the sky. The sun is also not a threat, as it's been active for billions of years and has yet to cause any harm to the Earth, the video sadly feels the need to point out.
"The story started with claims that Nibiru, a supposed planet discovered by the Sumerians, is headed toward Earth," NASA says in the video. "This catastrophe was initially predicted for May 2003, but when nothing happened the doomsday date was moved forward to December 2012 and linked to the end of one of the cycles in the ancient Mayan calendar at the winter solstice in 2012 -- hence the predicted doomsday date of December 21, 2012."
NASA's smugness is understandable. As the supposed Mayan end of times approaches on Dec. 21, people are frantically preparing for Armageddon the world over, flocking to such far off spiritual destinations as Bugarach, France and Mount Rtanj, Serbia to await alien saviors, a new dawn that will "upgrade" human consciousness, a door opening up another dimension and other surreal phenomena to occur.
The organization says rumors that suggest the Mayan end of days are based on misinterpretations of the Mayan calendar. Many wrongly assume the world will end on the 21st of December because the Mayan calendar "ends" on this day, but in reality it just marks the start of a new cycle.
"On the 21st, the date of the winter solstice, a calendar cycle called the 13th b'ak'tun comes to an end. Although Maya scholars agree that the ancient Maya would not have seen this day as apocalyptic, rumors have spread that a cosmic event may end life on Earth on that day," NASA explains.
"The 2012 end-of-the-world scenario is a hoax perpetrated by the scientifically illiterate on the scientifically under-informed," Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist and author, told The Huffington Post. "Earth is going to be here till the end of the solar system. The sun will die in five billion years," he assured.
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