End of the World Discussion

[Pumpkin_Man]

Hi Folkx:

I s uppose the end of the world can be considered a good Halloween topic because it is scary to some people, but I thought I would post it here in the off topic section any way.

lately, the History channel and various others are airing all kinds of documenteries about how the world could come to an end. Both secular, religious and various other predictions have been discussed, and whild I don't believe in much of what I see and hear, I think it's good entertainment.

Now everybody here pretty much knows my religious beliefs, so there's no need to belabor them here for the umteenth time. Needless to say, I believe in what the Bible says, and I have no clue as to when it's going to happen, so I'll leave it at that.

For the sake of discussion, however, I thought it would be fun to play around with some of the following topics for simple debate or discussion (not arguing of flaming):

The Mayan Prophecy of December 21, 2012.

Global Warming

Meteor or asteroid collision

Nuclear war

Armagedden

Edgar Casey's predictions

Naustrodamus's predictions

Or any other prediction, prohpet, prophecy or 'end of the world' fiction story you can thinkof.

Mike

[Rising Dead Man]

Only God knows. Not even the angels in Heaven know. Not even Jesus.

[Pumpkin_Man]

That's my take on it, RisingDeadMan. That's why when dates are given, I don't beleive them. But it's fun to talk about it.

Mike

[Andybev01]

The Stand (S. King) is one of my favorite apoc. books and they made a very good TV mini-series out of it that I have on DVD.

My all-time favorite EOTW movie is On The Beach (the original) with Gregory Peck, Ava Gardener, Fred Astaire, etc. I saw that one when I was in grade school (faking sick one day...) on the afternoon movie and it made a good impression!

[DemonSlayerMau]

It kind of bothers me because my grandparents insist that the end of the world is coming soon, because of signs in the Bible. But the thing of it is, we really don't know. It's in God's hands and I know we shouldn't worry about it. But talking about things like the rapture actually kind of scare me.
As for December 21st 2012...I have a notion it'll end up just like the Y2K phenomonon. I think people want the end of the world to happen. They want something to happen. The problem is, nothing does.
It's difficult to see God's works in action these days, but maybe the thing is we should just trust him to know that it will come when the time is right, and God won't let humanity be whiped clean from the earth until he's ready.
It does worry me, but it doesn't keep me from going about my daily life.
Something COULD happen in 2012...I don't think humanity will be whiped out though.

[Pumpkin_Man]

Again, the falicy with the December of 2012 prophecy is that any time an exact date is given, it's a falacy. I also remember how the Y2K bug was supposed to turn our civilization into a "pumpkin" at the strok of midnight on New Years Eve. They even had tv infomercials for "Y2K" survival kits, and I have no doubt at the 21st of December in 2012 draws near, they are going to be selling "Mayan Prophecy" survival kits, too.

I to think that there is something to the Biblical signs, but whether or now we are goinhg to see anything in our life times, I just don't know. Incidently, the Bible does not predict that humanity is going to be stamped out of existance. It predicts that the world is going to go back to beint the way it was prior to the fall of adam. Or in other words become a paradise once again. If you ask me, that's something to look forward to, not something to fear. But again, I am not a prophet, a theologist or a priest, so I do not presume to know when that's going to happen.

Mike

[Rising Dead Man]

What is the whole story of Y2K?

[Andybev01]

Y2K in a nut shell:

Software programmers used to abbreviate the year when typing a date such as 99 instead of 1999.

When all of the computers were going to change at midnight on December 31st 1999 to the new year, 2000, people freaked out because they didn't know what would happen if all of those networks thought it was 1900 instead of 2000.

Programmers made a fortune rewriting code to accomodate the whole year in thousands of systems.

Survivalists stokpiled guns food & ammo, and others profited off of their fears.

[Pumpkin_Man]

Our whole civilization was supposed to 'turn into a pumpkin' at the stroke of mightnight on New Years Day at one minute after. Cars were supposed to not start, water was supposed to stop running, electronic transactions were supposed to totaly shut down, power was supposed to fail, natural gas was supposed to stop flowing, and our entire society was just supposed to stop working because of this computer problem.

A few systems did actualy fail, but it was not the catastrophy that many thought it was going to be. Like andy said, there was a lot of profiteering off of the fear many had that was spread through the news media.

Mike

[DemonSlayerMau]

Gee Pumpkin Man, sounds an awful lot like what they're saying is going to happen in 2012 now. On December 21st 2012 people are saying that a "sun spot" is going to hit the earth and hault anything electronic from working because it's supposed to fry our wires and systems.
Evidently it happened once before whiping out the telegraph machines...but I never knew about that.

[Rising Dead Man]

Thats stupid. I would never believe that.

Y2K in a nut shell:

Software programmers used to abbreviate the year when typing a date such as 99 instead of 1999.

When all of the computers were going to change at midnight on December 31st 1999 to the new year, 2000, people freaked out because they didn't know what would happen if all of those networks thought it was 1900 instead of 2000.

Programmers made a fortune rewriting code to accomodate the whole year in thousands of systems.

Survivalists stokpiled guns food & ammo, and others profited off of their fears.

[Andybev01]

Mass hysteria is a very real thing.

Look up 'Orson Wells/War of the Worlds' for a great lesson on the power of suggestion.

[Pumpkin_Man]

Actualy, according to the Mayan prophecy, time itself is supposed to come to an end, and wipe out everythign on Earth. Again, since there's an exact date involved, I just don't believe it. But I'll be willing to bet that there will be people selling survival kits as that date draws closer.

Mike

[DemonSlayerMau]

Maybe I should build and make survival kits. I'll be sure to make quite a profit.

[Pumpkin_Man]

I thought about doing that myself. Narf Narf But on a more serious note, I'm sure we are going to be hearing about it endlessly as it gets closer to the date.

Mike