2012 Poll

thecommander · 30-06-2009 09:40AM #1

Do you believe that something big will happen on 21st December 2012?

Big = End of world, fall of all major governments, catastrophic weather worldwide, aliens, etc

Big ≠Moriarty tribunal ending, change in government of a single country, hailstones in Cape Town, localised minor events

samson09 · 30-06-2009 10:21AM

Maybe something major will happen leading up to that date, but right on 21st Dec.? Probably not.

Ponster · 30-06-2009 10:30AM

What's so special about the date ?

gpjordanf1 · 30-06-2009 10:50AM

it's just another Y2K conn job, theres nothing to it, which has been proven by a poster on the subject already, plenty of proof there, well for me anyway.

Mahatma coat · 30-06-2009 01:12PM

No

Cosmicaly??????? yeah, I think its probably the best guess date for the procession.

Will the world end??? Probably not;)

will a lot of people freakout??????? Probably:D:D:D

humanji · 30-06-2009 02:09PM

I'd say there could be a lot of shìt happening, but it will be mainly caused by hysteria. Can't see there being any world ending cataclysms, although I hope so as it will mean I can buy a house and not have to pay back the mortgage! :P

Mahatma coat · 30-06-2009 02:16PM

No

ah yeah, but solar flares may be anissue, planets cause gravitational pulls on suns and flares hapen from that afaik so if theres an alignment then it may cause a peak and shur Sheithappens, so fears of a Y2K style organised panic are not totaly unfounded

AdamusAdonis · 30-06-2009 03:46PM

I vote no, though to be fair, I can't see into the future...
Excuse me so.

30-06-2009 04:59PM

Mahatma coat wrote: »

ah yeah, but solar flares may be anissue, planets cause gravitational pulls on suns and flares hapen from that afaik so if theres an alignment then it may cause a peak ...

Gravitational pulls don't cause solar flares, neither do planetary alignments (or any sort of an alignment for that matter). Solar flares are the result of a sudden release of magnetic energy which was stored in the corona.

DTrotter · 30-06-2009 05:25PM

Read your horoscopes the day before combined with swinging a crystal over a ley line and you will get an answer. I dread the build up to 2012.

30-06-2009 05:27PM

The one nasty thing I see happening on 2012 is mass suicides due to the hype.

DTrotter · 30-06-2009 06:21PM

King Mob wrote: »

The one nasty thing I see happening on 2012 is mass suicides due to the hype.

As long as they don't take innocent children with them then it's just a case of less morons in the world.

toiletduck · 30-06-2009 07:37PM

Mahatma coat wrote: »

ah yeah, but solar flares may be anissue, planets cause gravitational pulls on suns and flares hapen from that afaik so if theres an alignment then it may cause a peak and shur Sheithappens, so fears of a Y2K style organised panic are not totaly unfounded

Where did you read that (gravitational pull of planets causing flares)? Never heard it...

espinolman · 30-06-2009 08:18PM

Mahatma coat wrote: »

ah yeah, but solar flares may be anissue, planets cause gravitational pulls on suns and flares hapen from that afaik so if theres an alignment then it may cause a peak and shur Sheithappens, so fears of a Y2K style organised panic are not totaly unfounded

Well i downloaded a planetarium last night and went forward in time to 21/12/2012 and i looked down on the planets and there was no alignment of the planets !

humanji · 01-07-2009 10:17AM

espinolman wrote: »

Well i downloaded a planetarium last night and went forward in time to 21/12/2012 and i looked down on the planets and there was no alignment of the planets !

I don't think it's a planetary alignment. I think it's solar systems or galaxies or something, will be aligned and some claim that it's going to act like some sort of galactic tuning fork. I'll try and figure out where I heard that.

edit: and here's a website that might come in handy: http://survive2012.com/

I'm not sure if it's serious or a pisstake, so depending on which way you look at it, it's either informative or hilarious.

Mahatma coat · 01-07-2009 10:55AM

No

toiletduck wrote: »

Where did you read that (gravitational pull of planets causing flares)? Never heard it...

Well it just made sense, I was watchin something else durin the week about the search for planets around stars and how we know planets are there because of the wobble they cause to the star.

its not a big stretch to theorise that the wobble will have a tidal effect and that this tidal effect may be responsible for the fluctuations and buildup of magnetic energy in the stars atmosphere that cause flares.

Ostrom · 01-07-2009 12:46PM

Mahatma coat wrote: »

Well it just made sense, I was watchin something else durin the week about the search for planets around stars and how we know planets are there because of the wobble they cause to the star.

its not a big stretch to theorise that the wobble will have a tidal effect and that this tidal effect may be responsible for the fluctuations and buildup of magnetic energy in the stars atmosphere that cause flares.

Elaborate on this theoretical 'tidal effect'

The closest thing to what you are describing is a coronal mass ejection halo which has nothing to do with the surrounding planets

Also, the 'wobble' phenomenon you are describing is an effect on the apparant light called microlensing

bonkey · 01-07-2009 01:06PM

efla wrote: »

The closest thing to what you are describing is a coronal mass ejection halo which has nothing to do with the surrounding planets

To be more accurate - its not known to have anything to do with the surrounding planets, nor has any mechanism been theorised where it could have something to do with same.

Also, the 'wobble' phenomenon you are describing is an effect on the apparant light called microlensing

IANAAP (I am not an Astro Physicist), but to try and forestall anyone looking up microlensing and discovering that its gravitational in nature...

The microlensing effect, AFAIK, is caused by the distortion the planet on the photons going by it. If we consider the path the light follows from the star to us, then we should intuitively see that the planet's gravitional field will have differiung effects depending on its position. When its in that path, it directly effects photons one way. When its outside that path, it doesn't. In effect, we end up with a repeating pattern, where the light-path is distorted by the planet as it orbits the star.

This is what we see.

It doesn't suggest that thee planet makes the star actually wobble, but rather that it distorts the light that comes to us from the star.

Having said that, it is true that planets exert a gravitational influence on stars that they orbit...albeit a very, very weak one.

Ostrom · 01-07-2009 01:20PM

bonkey wrote: »

To be more accurate - its not known to have anything to do with the surrounding planets, nor has any mechanism been theorised where it could have something to do with same.

IANAAP (I am not an Astro Physicist), but to try and forestall anyone looking up microlensing and discovering that its gravitational in nature...

The microlensing effect, AFAIK, is caused by the distortion the planet on the photons going by it. If we consider the path the light follows from the star to us, then we should intuitively see that the planet's gravitional field will have differiung effects depending on its position. When its in that path, it directly effects photons one way. When its outside that path, it doesn't. In effect, we end up with a repeating pattern, where the light-path is distorted by the planet as it orbits the star.

This is what we see.

It doesn't suggest that thee planet makes the star actually wobble, but rather that it distorts the light that comes to us from the star.

Having said that, it is true that planets exert a gravitational influence on stars that they orbit...albeit a very, very weak one.

Exactly, my point was that the effect is merely apparent [subjective]

20goto10 · 01-07-2009 01:40PM

21st December 2012 is the winter Solstice....clever people them Mayans.

01-07-2009 02:11PM

efla wrote: »

Exactly, my point was that the effect is merely apparent [subjective]

Not exactly.

A star and it's planet (it's more complicated for systems involving more than one planet) orbit their common centre of mass; an orbiting planet can (and does, in many many cases) have an affect on its star's orbit. I believe the branch of astrophysics which deals with this is called astrometry.

Ostrom · 01-07-2009 02:21PM

-JammyDodger- wrote: »

Not exactly.

A star and it's planet (it's more complicated for systems involving more than one planet) orbit their common centre of mass; an orbiting planet can (and does, in many many cases) have an affect on its star's orbit. I believe the branch of astrophysics which deals with this is called astrometry.

As I had understood*, the gravitational effect on the stars orbit by an orbiting mass such as a planet was negligible

I'm addressing the above point where it was claimed there was a relationship between the influence of the orbiting body and mass ejection

*I'm a complete amateur and happy to have this corrected under greater authority - I'm just stuck into the books at the moment and this was one of the last things I came across

01-07-2009 02:25PM

efla wrote: »

As I had understood, the gravitational effect on the stars orbit by an orbiting mass such as a planet was negligible

Well, not exactly. The gravitational effect is "large" enough to be used as a valuable tool for extrasolar planet detection. It's called astrometry.

Edit: I'm addressing somebody's saying that planets cannot cause wobbles in the stars they orbit. To address your point, it's true that currently it is thought that planets don't affect the build up and occurance of mass ejection in the stars they orbit.

Ostrom · 01-07-2009 02:38PM

-JammyDodger- wrote: »

Well, not exactly. The gravitational effect is "large" enough to be used as a valuable tool for extrasolar planet detection. It's called astrometry.

As best we know, does this effect operate only visually at the level of the apparent direction of light?

01-07-2009 03:00PM

efla wrote: »

As best we know, does this effect operate only visually at the level of the apparent direction of light?

I'm not entirely sure what you're asking; it this doesn't answer it rephrase the question, maybe.

It's not a visual effect; the planet and the star orbit around their common centre of mass (this is typically inside of the star), so, if you were to look at the star from any angle, you would see it moving slightly over and back, in a periodic motion. It's not a visual effect, it's a physical motion.

Ostrom · 01-07-2009 03:27PM

That answers it, yes.

I was unsure of the extent to which the motion of the star as you are describing could be attributed solely to the planet, and whether or not the motion was an observed movement of the light or an actual movement of the star.

01-07-2009 03:31PM

efla wrote: »

That answers it, yes.

I was unsure of the extent to which the motion of the star as you are describing could be attributed solely to the planet, and wheather or not the motion was an observed movement of the light or an actual movement of the star.

Oh right right. Yah, the planet actually moves the star (by very very little), but enough to be noticable to extremely powerful telescopes. You see, it's just as correct to say that the star orbits the planet, as it is to say that the planet orbits the star; because, simply, both statements are wrong: they both, infact, orbit their common centre of mass.

But, you're right in that there are other techniques used which involve the observed frequency of the emitted light etc. (such as the Doppler effect).

6th · 01-07-2009 04:41PM

I'm happy to kep this here but might invite some of the folks from there to come and give their input?

humanji · 01-07-2009 04:56PM

There's a section on Wikipedia about this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/December_21_2012

There's a bit about the galactic alignment and also a bit about the date beign wrong. Some people say that according to the Mayan calender, we're only 41,341,049,999,999,999,999,999,994,879 years off the actual end date. Might have to set my alarm for that.

watty · 01-07-2009 08:40PM

they use VERY sensitive instruments.

For example they can detect the equivalent of a grain of sand passing a car headlamp and the observer miles away..

We are talking about VERY small wobbles and often planets several times larger than Jupiter, that are almost as big as small stars, on quite close orbits.

jonbravo · 04-07-2009 01:59AM

No

anything with an end date........ is more then likely b/llsh[t, 2016 on the other hand,i feel is more then an important year to us all as time will tell.

2012 Poll

Will something big happen on 21st Dec 2012 48 votes

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