Sunday, February 1, 2009

CNN on 2012- a little shoddy on the skepticism

CNN has a fairly fluffy new article summarizing the 2012 apocalypticism gobbledygook that seems to be slowly seeping its way into popular culture as we approach the dreaded date.

They do come down rather hard on the "Mayan prophecy" bunk, quoting an expert on Mesoamerican history, David Stuart, saying that "There is no serious scholar who puts any stock in the idea that the Maya said anything meaningful about 2012."

But they sort of leave it at that. They immediately follow up this quote with a rather cutesy concession to the bunkanistas of the world: "But take the fact that December 21, 2012, coincides with the winter solstice, add claims the Maya picked the time period because it also marks an alignment of the sun with the center of the Milky Way galaxy, and you have the makings of an online sensation."

Of course, never mind that the Maya never said any such thing (in so many words; given enough creativity on the part of the reader, the Maya apparently can have said anything). They waste some more time letting a bad author spout some nonsense about 2012 being "a very dramatic and probably transformative year," whatever that means. CNN did not ask. The article concludes with some rather waffly quotes, and a bit of hiding of the fact that the Mayans neither said nor knew anything about the center of the Milky Way.

All in all, not a lot to work with here. Mostly just an underinformed human-interest story. Unsurprisingly, they couldn't find anyone to speak for their story who could offer any actual evidence for any of the ridiculous claims being made about 2012.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Hmm well I've been interested in this whole 2012 thing for the past ahh year or so, and honestly yea the only "proof" that I've came across is the SPT pictures that were supposeably "leaked" by a direct sourse from the nibirushock2012 from youtube. Anyways I was just curious as to; yes there's many prophecies but besides that, the planets are supposed to be aligned just right in 2012 for the sun to have its worst solar storms in a long time "scorching the earth" as the bible would say. And also something about, when we cross the galactic plane photonic light is supposed to maybe "awaken" us, just things I've been reading up on, interesting but who knows what's true now days. Look up ayahuasca, the vine of the serpent. It also relates to nibiru in some way and also shaman or something like that. Very interesting

Unknown said...

Sorry for the spelling, source*

GoodNewsAtheism said...

Just bring me the evidence and you're in. Unsubstantiated rumors you get from youtube and whatnot do not qualify. Find the the information, or have those people contact me themselves.

Unknown said...

Check out the site satansrapture.com says many things, but the main one "nasa confirms an ancient 'comet' coming to pass sometime in 2012, maybe even december 21 2012 as some believe" and speaks of the antichrist on earth today

Anonymous said...

what happen to the people of this age, is true that all the prophecies about the end of the world has failed, but because of this we can't close our mind to the signals, like the global warming, the creation of Generic Viagra and LHC, all this are signals the human being is nearly to lost all that is really important .