The Clever Badger One lab accident away from being a super villain

The Institute for Human Continuity

I'm cranky this evening, so this is just a rant to unload a little.

I was flipping channels this evening and saw a commercial for The Institute for Human Continuity.

At first glance, it appears to be a website for an organization that's bought into the concept of 2012 millenarianism - the idea that the world will end or face some sort of catastrophic event on the last day of the Mayan Long Count calendar.

In point of fact, The Institute for Human Continuity is part of a viral marketing campaign for an upcoming movie, 2012,  directed by Roland Emmerich.

Because it's directed by Roland Emmerich, we can be fairly certain of two things:

1. It will contain many, many explosions
2. It will have a plot that is held together with spit and twine

Now, while the movie will rise or fall on its own merits (such as they are...), I can't help but be annoyed at the continued attention that the Mayan calendar is getting.

It's beyond stupid.

The whole thing is predicated on the idea that the Mayan calendar ends in December, 2012, and that since the Mayans were so good at predicting things (except, conspicuously, the arrival of the Spanish...), there must be some significance to that final date.

There isn't.

The Mayan calendar is cyclic.  If anyone were still using it to reckon dates, then they'd turn the page on December 21, 2012, and start over.

Claiming that the world is going to end on December 20, 2012 (or any time thereabouts) is just as boneheaded as claiming that the world is going to end on December 31, 2012 (which, oddly, is the last day of our cyclic calendar for that year).

It shouldn't be any surprise that ancient civilizations had a thing for calendars - very accurate calendars - since their continued well-being depended on knowing when to plant crops and when to expect the harvests to come in.  It also shouldn't be surprising that their calendars were wrapped up with religious trappings, since significant aspects of many ancient religions were tied somehow to agriculture.  And it's finally not surprising that people have subjected these ancient calendars to bizarre numerological interpretations - if you stare at anything long enough, you'll start to see patterns that aren't there.

But for goodness' sake, folks, enough with this Mayan calendar crap.

CB