2012

ladyofthelake

I have hears SO much about doomsday 2012. It is really possible that the sun aligning with the black hole at the center of the galaxy could cause polar shift?

D0nners

In a word, No.

Hauk

No.

backboiler

"Align" is a catchy word an' all but what do you think it means?
How can two bodies (your black hole and the Sun) align? Align with what!? They're just points.

Zillah

The concept of the sun aligning with a blackhole in the centre of the galaxy is completely irrelevant. The concept means nothing. First of all they are still so incredibly far away from each other that they don't interact in any way beyond the blackhole's gravity continuing to contribute to holding the galaxy together, and second of all, as blackboiler said, 'aligning' doesn't mean anything. You draw an arbitrary line between earth, the sun and the centre of the galaxy...it means nothing.

Linguo

Means diddily squat but will make a damn entertaining movie, cant wait to see it!:D

A7X

Isn't the sun always in alignment with the centre of the galaxy as long as you look from the sun to the centre.

Ostrom

ladyofthelake wrote: »

I have hears SO much about doomsday 2012. It is really possible that the sun aligning with the black hole at the center of the galaxy could cause polar shift?

These 'dates' are amazing and sometimes horrific insights into baseless collective consensus. It is more than enough to make any arbitrary claim, support it with some minimal mismatched scientific vocabulary and contrived authority, then spend the remainder of the debate demanding your opponent disprove. I hate these things, not just for their demonstration of how far individual common sense can be crippled by a mass chiming of non-experts, but how they parasitically suck people of both sides into pointless ad hominem debates, wasting time that could be spent on productive learning.

Jim

Also the fact that one of the Popes changed our calender by a few years makes the date completly irrelevent.

Zillah

Not to mention the fact that the Mayans never actually predicted anything specific for 2012.

slade_x

The question doesnt make any sense whatsover. An alignment in such a sense means nothing other than from a particular perspective. An alignment in a well known sense can result in an eclipse.

For example The moon eclipsing the sun, From an observer on earth the moon intersects our view of the sun, resulting in an observable eclipse, The earth, moon and sun appear in alignment.

Its also possible planets orbiting the sun at the right time can be in alignment meaning that you would be able to plot a line from planet 1 to planet 3 that would intersect a planet 2 or alternatively two planets aligning in relation to the sun. for example at the time when mars is closest to the earth. One could draw a line originating from earth to the sun and have mars intersect that line as it orbits. In effect mars eclipses the sun. This would be the best time to either observe mars from earth or travel from earth to mars efficiently or vice versa


The original question is like asking when the moon is in alignment with earth. As depending on the moons position any time the observer is behind the moon to eclipse or block the view of earth you could say you see the moon and the earth in alignment from your perspective

The supermassive black hole in the center of the galaxy has less of an effect on the sun than jupiter does.

Against my better judgement ill leave this open, and let it die

DigiGal

Its nice to finally hear some astronomical opinions on this

ladyofthelake

I thought that is was a hype, but just wait and see when 2012 does come around it'll be all over the news - both for and against and people will be building shelters and hoarding food - just like Y2K but worse!