Page 14 - 201212 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - December 2012

8 Weird Predictions for End of the World 8 of the Weirdest Predictions for the End of the World Continued from Page 13 Space God Appears on TV (1998): God and spaceships both pretty common components of a good apocalyptic prediction, and as we saw in the case of the Seekers, sometimes they blend. Hon-Ming Chen added a few extra layers of weird to his doomsday theology. The leader of the Taiwanese group Chen Tao (the "True Way"), also known as the God's Salvation Church, Chen predicted that God, who will look just like Chen, would appear on every television set in the world on March 25, 1998 on channel 18, ready to take Chen's followers to the afterlife. (A sizable portion of the remaining population would die, of course.) This by itself isn't quite enough to set Chen apart from other doomsday cultists (the New York Times published a convenient list of millennial doomsday sects in 1999), but for an extra bit of oddity, Chen predicted that God's spaceship would land in Garland, Texas, for no small town has become a destination for 2012 thorough the inner solar system. It there had reason other than it kind of sounds like "God's been such interlopers, the Moon would have Land." He moved hundreds of his Taiwanese apocalypse believers of all stripes. The denizens been stripped from the Earth and the orbits of of Bugarach aren't exactly thrilled about this followers to Texas, ordering them to wear white dubious attention; the mayor announced that the the inner planets would have high eccentricity smocks and cowboy hats. When the appointed village is closed to visitors until doomsday is and inclination. Not only does Nibiru not exist day arrived and God failed to appear, two-thirds safely behind us. That hasn't stopped some now, we can be sure that no rogue planets have of Chen's followers abandoned him. He moved locals from making a killing renting out their been entering the inner solar system over the the remaining faithful to a town outside Buffalo, apocalypse-proof homes. [] past million years. where they continued to wear cowboy hats and You don’t need to take my word for it. Just use anticipate the apocalypse. common sense. Have you seen Nibiru? In 2008 many websites said it would be visible to the A Punch in the Face from Planet X (1995): Nibiru and Doomsday naked eye in spring 2009. If a large planet or There are plenty of folks who brown dwarf were headed for the inner solar claim inside knowledge on the apocalypse 2012: Questions and system in 2012, it would already be tracked by thanks to aliens, but Nancy Lieder's Nibiru hundreds of thousands of astronomers, cataclysm has managed to gain quite a bit of Answers professional and amateur, all over the world. Do traction. By 1997, Lieder's claim that aliens you know any amateur astronomers who are known as Zeta Reticulans had warned her of a Continued from Page 12 watching it? Have you seen any photos or planetary object known as Planet X (later discussion of it in the big popular astronomy connected to the mythological planet Nibiru 19. Can you prove to me that Nibiru is a magazines like Sky & Telescope? Just think cooked up by ancient astronaut proponent hoax? There are so many reports that about it. No one could hide Nibiru if it existed. Zecharia Sitchin) that would knock Earth off its something terrible will happen in 2012. I axis, triggering a cataclysmic pole shift, was so need proof because the government and are 20. If Nibiru is a hoax, why doesn’t issue a well known that she was mentioned in the New keeping so much from us. denial? How can you permit these lies to York Times. Astronomers have repeatedly circulate and frighten people? Why doesn’t debunked Lieder's claims, but conspiracy Yes I can prove it. Remember what Nibiru is the U.S. government do something about it! theories persist, with Lieder's supporters said to be: a planet as large as the Earth on an claiming that NASA is covering up evidence of If you go to the NASA home page, nasa.gov, Nibiru's existence. CalTech professor of eccentric 3600-year orbit around the Sun that you will see many stories that expose the threatens to collide or come close to the Earth in astronomy Mike Brown said in 2009 that Nibiru December 2012. If it existed, it would by now Nibiru-2012 hoax. Try searching nasa.gov is the most common pseudoscientific topic he is (early 2012) be visible to everyone in the night under “Nibiru” or “2012”. There is not much asked about (although there was also a spike in sky. Obviously it is not there. You can’t hide a more that NASA can do. These hoaxes have "Planet X" questions thanks to marketing for the nothing to do with NASA and are not based on film 2012). Hopefully, this pseudoscientific planet that is due here in less than a year. NASA data, so we as an agency are not directly Further, a real planet would have sufficient claim will start to die off with the new year; our mass to perturb the orbits of Mars and the Earth. involved. But scientists, both within NASA and Melancholia end was predicted to come in outside, recognize that this hoax with its effort 2012. Some people talk about an external object to frighten people is a distraction from more changing the tilt of the Earth’s axis or triggering important science concerns, such as global earthquakes, which is silly, but its gravity would Safety in Bugarach (present): warming and loss of biological diversity. We Many doomsday predictors of various be distorting planetary orbits if it were real. One worry about the effect of this fear on sects believe that the "upside-down mountain," way we would know this is from the daily impressionable children. But we live in a Pic de Bugarach, houses aliens who will rescue communication links between the Earth and country where there is freedom of speech, and several spacecraft orbiting Mars and operating them from the December 21st apocalypse. on its surface. The radio signals measure the that includes freedom to lie. You should be glad What's especially odd about this prediction is precise distance and relative speed between the there are no censors. But if you will just use that it's not clear exactly where it came from; two planets, and any deviation would be common sense I am sure you can recognize the New Agers have been flocking to the commune lies. You can find a good summary of the of Bugarach since the 1960s to bask in the immediately recognized. Finally, we also know scientific position on 2012 doomsday at that no planet has been regularly passing mountain's alleged mystical qualities. Now the http://2012hoax.org. []