Doomsday predictions on sea level rises are 'false alarm' - levels always fluctuate, says expert as climate change row heats up

Satellite data 'tilted to distort figures'

Historical data suggests sea rises and fall naturally

UN 'expert' admits 'We had to adjust data, otherwise there would be no new trend'

Climate expert describes sea levels as 'artificial crisis'

Predictions that rising sea levels will swallow up low lying islands are a 'false alarm', an expert has claimed.

Apocalyptic warnings that islands such as the Maldives will sink beneath the waves are far-fetched, said Nils Axel-Morner, former head of the Paleogeophysics and Geodynamics department at Stockholm University.

He says that any rise in sea levels is to do with natural historic fluctuations.

Opening this year's UN Climate Conference Mohammed Nasheed, President of the Maldives, warned this his country was 'an island nation that may slip beneath the waves if all this talk on climate does not lead to action soon'.

While, in his briefing to the convention, Rajenda Pachauri, head of the International Panel on Climate Change, outlined the dangers science anticipates unless carbon emissions are curbed.

He said that coastal areas and islands are threatened with inundation by global warming.

But in a provocative article in the Spectator, Axel-Morner says: 'I have conducted six field trips to the Maldives. I can report that while such regions do have problems, they need not fear rising sea levels.'

Axel-Morner said that cycles from the 18th and 17th century proved that current rises were not related to global warming.
He said that the IPCC's views on sea-level rises were invalid..

'Sea level rises are affected by a great many factors, such as the speed at which the earth rotates. They rose in the order of 10cm to 11cm between 1850 and 1940.'

'It is clear that sea levels rise and fall entirely independently of so-called 'climate change',' he said.

Alex-Morner claims that data from satellites has been 'tilted' to distort figures - and that a member of the IPCC admitted to him, 'We had to do so otherwise there would be no new trend.'

Pachauri's claims also included that within a decade, up to 250million more people will face the stress of scarce water.

Increasingly frequent weather disasters have imposed heavy financial burdens, with some poor countries running up 90 perc ent of their national debt to deal with the aftermath of storms, droughts and floods, he said.

'Developed countries as a whole are not taking climate change seriously as a global issue,' Seyni Nafo, of Mali, said.

'Look at the U.S. We use and we welcome their leadership on democracy, on access to markets, on human rights issues. We would want to have the same leadership to tackle climate change, because for us in the developing world the biggest threat, the biggest enemy, is climate change.”

Rajendra Pachauri gave no explicit deadlines but the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change implied that the world only has a few years before the Earth is irreversibly damaged by accumulations of carbon in the atmosphere.

Phew! Mayan prediction of world ending in 2012 may be a 'misreading' - it's just the start of a new era, says expert

• Conspiracy theorists predict 'end of the world'
  
• Expert says it's a misreading - it's a symbolic date
• Refers to a new period in the religious calendar

By Rob Waugh

Last updated at 6:07 PM on 1st December 2011

An inscription found in the Mayan temple of Tortuguero make a prediction of an apocalyptic even in 2012 - with some conspiracy theorists predicting the world being swallowed by a black hole, the sun, or just clipped by a passing asteroid.

The Mayan inscriptions refer to Bolon Yokte 'descending from the sky' in 2012 - a god associated with war and the underworld.

But a German expert, Sven Gronemeyer, says that the whole thing could just be a misreading.

The tablet on which the inscription was found has a break which makes the end nearly illegible - but even so, the legible parts don't necessarily spell oncoming doomsday.

Gronemeyer said his decoding of a Mayan artefact with a reference to a 2012 date denotes a transition to a new era in the Mayan calendar - and not a possible end of the world.

Bolon Yokte is a figure also associated with change.

Many Mayans also dismiss the apocalyptic predictions as largely a Western idea.

Rather than the end of time itself, the inscription refers to the start of a new era.

The interpretation of the hieroglyphs by Sven Gronemeyer of La Trobe University in Australia was presented for the first time at the archaeological site of Palenque in southern Mexico.

His comments came less than a week after Mexico's archaeology institute acknowledged there was a second reference to the 2012 date in Mayan inscriptions - touching off another round of talk (and panic) about whether it predicts the end of the world.

Mr Gronemeyer has been studying the stone tablet found years ago at the archaeological site of Tortuguero in Mexico's Gulf coast state of Tabasco.

He said the inscription describes the return of mysterious Mayan god Bolon Yokte at the end of a 13th period of 400 years, known as Baktuns, on the equivalent of December 21, 2012.

Mayans considered 13 a sacred number. There is nothing apocalyptic in the date, he said.

The text was carved about 1,300 years ago. The stone has cracked, which has made the end of the passage almost illegible.

Mr Gronemeyer said the inscription refers to the end of a cycle of 5,125 years since the beginning of the Mayan Long Count calendar in 3113 B.C.

The fragment was a prophecy of then ruler Bahlam Ajaw, who wanted to plan the passage of the god, Mr Gronemeyer said.

'For the elite of Tortuguero, it was clear they had to prepare the land for the return of the god and for Bahlam Ajaw to be the host of this initiation,' he said.

Bolon Yokte, god of creation and war, was to prevail that day in a sanctuary of Tortuguero.

'The date acquired a symbolic value because it is seen as a reflection of the day of creation,' Mr Gronemeyer said. 'It is the passage of a god and not necessarily a great leap for humanity.'

Last week, Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology said a second inscription mentioning the 2012 date is on the carved or moulded face of a brick found at the Comalcalco ruin, near the Tortuguero site. It is being kept at the institute and is not on display.

Experts doubt the second inscription is a definite reference to the date cited as the possible end of the world, saying there is no future tense marking like there is in the Tortuguero tablet.

The institute has tried to dispel talk of a 2012 apocalypse, the subject of numerous postings and stories on the internet.

Its latest step was to arrange a special round table of Mayan experts this week at Palenque, which is where Mr Gronemeyer made his comments.

New interview with writer Erich von Däniken, covering the subjects of Maya culture, 2012, crop circles and possible connections with other star systems...

A troubling brew of manmade and natural disasters are pushing today's headlines from grim to grimmer and many now wonder if the prophecies of global cataclysm are coming to pass. This is why the ranks of those experiencing 2012 precognition through dreams, premonitions and other supernormal means, are soaring. Are you wondering if this is you and if we can endure and prevail all this without fear, dogma and hate? If so, take heart because we can, and this free video program explain why.

History Channel The world is coming to an end on December 21, 2012! The ancient Maya made this stunning prediction more than 2,000 years ago. We'll peel back the layers of mystery and examine in detail how the Maya calculated the exact date of doomsday. Journey back to the ancient city of Chichen Itza, the hub of Maya civilization deep in the heart of Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, to uncover the truth about this prophecy. The Maya were legendary astronomers and timekeepers--their calendar is more accurate than our own. By tracking the stars and planets they assigned great meaning to astronomical phenomena and made extraordinary predictions based on them--many of which have come true. Could their doomsday prophecy be one of them? In insightful interviews archaeologists, astrologers, and historians speculate on the meaning of the 2012 prophecy. Their answers are as intriguing as the questions.

2012: Killer Solar Flares Are a Physical Impossibility


Given a legitimate need to protect Earth from the most intense forms of space weather – great bursts of electromagnetic energy and particles that can sometimes stream from the sun – some people worry that a gigantic "killer solar flare" could hurl enough energy to destroy Earth. Citing the accurate fact that solar activity is currently ramping up in its standard 11-year cycle, there are those who believe that 2012 could be coincident with such a flare.

But this same solar cycle has occurred over millennia. Anyone over the age of 11 has already lived through such a solar maximum with no harm. In addition, the next solar maximum is predicted to occur in late 2013 or early 2014, not 2012.

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The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft captured this image of a solar flare as it erupted from the sun early on Tuesday, October 28, 2003. This was the most powerful flare measured with modern methods. Credit: NASA/SOHO Most importantly, however, even the biggest solar flares are not powerful enough to physically destroy Earth.

This is not to say that space weather can't affect our planet. The explosive heat of a solar flare can't make it all the way to our globe, but electromagnetic radiation and energetic particles certainly can. Solar flares can temporarily alter the upper atmosphere creating disruptions with signal transmission from, say, a GPS satellite to Earth causing it to be off by many yards. Another phenomenon produced by the sun could be even more disruptive. Known as a coronal mass ejection (CME), these solar explosions propel bursts of particles and electromagnetic fluctuations into Earth's atmosphere. Those fluctuations could induce electric fluctuations at ground level that could blow out transformers in power grids. The CME's particles can also collide with crucial electronics onboard a satellite and disrupt its systems.

In an increasingly technological world, where almost everyone relies on cell phones and GPS controls not just your in-car map system, but also airplane navigation and the extremely accurate clocks that govern financial transactions, space weather is a serious matter.

But it is a problem the same way hurricanes are a problem. One can protect oneself with advance information and proper precautions. During a hurricane watch, a homeowner can stay put . . . or he can seal up the house, turn off the electronics and get out of the way. Similarly, scientists at NASA and NOAA give warnings to electric companies, spacecraft operators, and airline pilots before a CME comes to Earth so that these groups can take proper precautions. Improving these predictive abilities the same way weather prediction has improved over the last few decades is one of the reasons NASA studies the sun and space weather. We can't ignore space weather, but we can take appropriate measures to protect ourselves.

And, even at their worst, the sun's flares are not physically capable of destroying Earth.

Scenes from the motion picture "2012." Courtesy Columbia Pictures. Remember the Y2K scare? It came and went without much of a whimper because of adequate planning and analysis of the situation. Impressive movie special effects aside, Dec. 21, 2012, won't be the end of the world as we know. It will, however, be another winter solstice.

Much like Y2K, 2012 has been analyzed and the science of the end of the Earth thoroughly studied. Contrary to some of the common beliefs out there, the science behind the end of the world quickly unravels when pinned down to the 2012 timeline. Below, NASA Scientists answer several questions that we're frequently asked regarding 2012.

Question (Q): Are there any threats to the Earth in 2012? Many Internet websites say the world will end in December 2012.
Answer (A): Nothing bad will happen to the Earth in 2012. Our planet has been getting along just fine for more than 4 billion years, and credible scientists worldwide know of no threat associated with 2012.

Q: What is the origin of the prediction that the world will end in 2012?
A: The story started with claims that Nibiru, a supposed planet discovered by the Sumerians, is headed toward Earth. This catastrophe was initially predicted for May 2003, but when nothing happened the doomsday date was moved forward to December 2012. Then these two fables were linked to the end of one of the cycles in the ancient Mayan calendar at the winter solstice in 2012 -- hence the predicted doomsday date of December 21, 2012.

Q: Does the Mayan calendar end in December 2012?
A: Just as the calendar you have on your kitchen wall does not cease to exist after December 31, the Mayan calendar does not cease to exist on December 21, 2012. This date is the end of the Mayan long-count period but then -- just as your calendar begins again on January 1 -- another long-count period begins for the Mayan calendar.


Q: Could phenomena occur where planets align in a way that impacts Earth?
A: There are no planetary alignments in the next few decades, Earth will not cross the galactic plane in 2012, and even if these alignments were to occur, their effects on the Earth would be negligible. Each December the Earth and sun align with the approximate center of the Milky Way Galaxy but that is an annual event of no consequence.

"There apparently is a great deal of interest in celestial bodies, and their locations and trajectories at the end of the calendar year 2012. Now, I for one love a good book or movie as much as the next guy. But the stuff flying around through cyberspace, TV and the movies is not based on science. There is even a fake NASA news release out there..."
- Don Yeomans, NASA senior research scientist Q: Is there a planet or brown dwarf called Nibiru or Planet X or Eris that is approaching the Earth and threatening our planet with widespread destruction?
A: Nibiru and other stories about wayward planets are an Internet hoax. There is no factual basis for these claims. If Nibiru or Planet X were real and headed for an encounter with the Earth in 2012, astronomers would have been tracking it for at least the past decade, and it would be visible by now to the naked eye. Obviously, it does not exist. Eris is real, but it is a dwarf planet similar to Pluto that will remain in the outer solar system; the closest it can come to Earth is about 4 billion miles.

Q: What is the polar shift theory? Is it true that the earth’s crust does a 180-degree rotation around the core in a matter of days if not hours?
A: A reversal in the rotation of Earth is impossible. There are slow movements of the continents (for example Antarctica was near the equator hundreds of millions of years ago), but that is irrelevant to claims of reversal of the rotational poles. However, many of the disaster websites pull a bait-and-shift to fool people. They claim a relationship between the rotation and the magnetic polarity of Earth, which does change irregularly, with a magnetic reversal taking place every 400,000 years on average. As far as we know, such a magnetic reversal doesn’t cause any harm to life on Earth. A magnetic reversal is very unlikely to happen in the next few millennia, anyway.

Earth, as seen in the Blue Marble: Next Generation collection of images, showing the color of the planet's surface in high resolution. This image shows South America from September 2004. Q: Is the Earth in danger of being hit by a meteor in 2012?
A: The Earth has always been subject to impacts by comets and asteroids, although big hits are very rare. The last big impact was 65 million years ago, and that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs. Today NASA astronomers are carrying out a survey called the Spaceguard Survey to find any large near-Earth asteroids long before they hit. We have already determined that there are no threatening asteroids as large as the one that killed the dinosaurs. All this work is done openly with the discoveries posted every day on the NASA NEO Program Office website, so you can see for yourself that nothing is predicted to hit in 2012.

Q: How do NASA scientists feel about claims of pending doomsday?
A: For any claims of disaster or dramatic changes in 2012, where is the science? Where is the evidence? There is none, and for all the fictional assertions, whether they are made in books, movies, documentaries or over the Internet, we cannot change that simple fact. There is no credible evidence for any of the assertions made in support of unusual events taking place in December 2012.

Q: Is there a danger from giant solar storms predicted for 2012?
A: Solar activity has a regular cycle, with peaks approximately every 11 years. Near these activity peaks, solar flares can cause some interruption of satellite communications, although engineers are learning how to build electronics that are protected against most solar storms. But there is no special risk associated with 2012. The next solar maximum will occur in the 2012-2014 time frame and is predicted to be an average solar cycle, no different than previous cycles throughout history.

Believers in Mysterious Planet Nibiru, Comet Elenin Await Earth's End

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/07/24/believers-in-mysterious-planet-nibiru-comet-elenin-await-earths-end/#ixzz1ekBq8k5l

Secrets of the Maya

A new exhibit at the Royal Ontario Museum features new discoveries from Mayan ruins and addresses the legends surrounding 2012.

By Jamie Bradburn

Maya: Secrets of their Ancient World
Royal Ontario Museum (100 Queen’s Park)
November 19, 2011–April 9, 2012
$25 adults, $22.50 students and seniors

As we approached the seating area for a press conference about the Royal Ontario Museum’s next major exhibit yesterday, we were greeted by a man in blue body paint and a tall headdress wielding a weapon. While he was there to pose for the media (and is pictured above), we couldn’t resist letting our imagination run free to speculate that he was on hand as a ghost of a past civilization warning us of future calamity.

Along with the ROM’s recently reduced admission prices, it probably won’t hurt the museum’s attendance figures that the Maya: Secrets of their Ancient World exhibit that opens to the public this Saturday ties into the hype surrounding the Mayan long-form calendar prophecies—ones that some believe spell either glory or doom for the world next December.

The exhibition is a collaborative effort between the ROM, the Canadian Museum of Civilization (where it will run later in 2012), and Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History (Spanish website). Over 250 artifacts ranging from giant incense burners to rings for ball games have been gathered from the ROM’s collection, various museums in the Yucatan, and institutions from overseas (British Museum) and across the street (Gardiner Museum of Ceramic Art). Many items, especially those recently excavated from the ruins of the city of Palenque, are being presented in public for the first time.

Installed in the basement Garfield Weston Exhibition Hall, the exhibit is divided into seven sections covering various aspects of Mayan culture: The Maya World, The City, Cosmology and Ritual, Writing and Timekeeping, The Palace, Death, and Collapse and Survival. We were particularly drawn to the Writing and Timekeeping section, especially the exhibits on the efforts to decipher the glyphs that are the written legacy of the Mayans. Videos and touch-screen panels explain how researchers have determined that the symbols often represent syllables instead of individual letters or whole words. Like the rest of the exhibit, this section includes recreations of objects on display so that the visually impaired or those who enjoy a tactile component as part of their museum experience can touch the items without damaging the originals. This section also addresses the stories around 2012 and the Mayan calendar, including a projected clock on the wall. The ROM is also offering numerous tie-ins to the show, including a lecture series, graphic novels, and a Maya-themed sleepover for kids.

As part of the press conference, we were served samples of Mayan-themed dishes that will appear on the menus of both C5 and the Food Studio Cafe during the exhibit’s run, including some rich hot chocolate. No toasts to the upcoming apocalypse, though.

(Newser) – The bad news is that Mayan ruins make not one but two apparent references to a possible apocalypse in 2012. The good news—maybe—is that Mexican archeologists say not to worry about it. Experts have finally confirmed that a second suspected reference to 2012 was found at the Comalcalco ruin in an inscription that has been safeguarded in storage for years by Mexico. An earlier find from the nearby Tortuguero site in the Gulf coast state of Tabasco named the same apparent date on a stone tablet. The Tortuguero inscription describes some kind of world-ending or world-changing event that is supposed to occur in December 2012 involving Bolon Yokte, a Mayan god linked to both war and creation.

But some experts say translating the Mayan date to 2012 is inaccurate, and officials at Mexico's Institute of Anthropology and History have long said such fears are a Westernized misinterpretation of what happens at the end of a Mayan calendar cycle. "Western messianic thought has twisted the cosmo-vision of ancient civilizations like the Maya," the institute said in a statement yesterday. But concern is running so high that a roundtable of 60 Mayan experts will meet next week at Palenque to "dispel some of the doubts about the end of one era and the beginning of another," the statement added. MORE