Some Calmer Voices Regarding 2012

Predictions of calamity in 2012 continue to broaden commercially, with more television shows and more new books dedicated to the apocalyptic prognostications rooted in the Mayan Long Count Calendar. After all, fear always has been good for business.

A recent article in the Houston Chronicle did a good job of capturing the controversy, especially interviewing some scholars and historians who tend to disavow the potential of apocalypse:

Most scholars discount the apocalyptic interpretation of the date. Indeed, Mayan prophecy about 2012 is hard to trace because evidence from original sources is limited. It exists in fragments and is often contradictory, said Mark Van Stone, an art history professor at Southwestern College in Chula Vista, Calif., and an expert on Mayan hieroglyphics. But Stone is convinced the Mayas did not consider 12/21/12 the end of time. “Nearly everything we read about 2012 is modern people projecting on the Maya their fantasies,” he said.

And:

The date Dec. 21, 2012, is important to the Maya in the way New Year’s Eve might be important to a reveler, said Sandra Noble, executive director of the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies in Florida. “It is not a doomsday; it is a party,” she said.

Of course the doomsday predictors have their say in the article as well ~ as they will for the next three years and seven months.

Click here for the Houston Chronicle article.