The 2012 Winter Solstice Non-event

The 2012 Winter Solstice Non-event
by astronomy author Stephen Tonkin
[extracts]

“In his book Fingerprints of the Gods (1996), Graham Hancock, in a chapter entitled A Computer for Calculating the End of the World, states that the Maya civilization of Central America :-

‘...believed that the cycle will come to an end, amid
global destruction, on [...] 23 December 2012 …’
[Note. 1 ]

“This, and similar writings, is possibly one of the triggers for a whole load of ill-considered speculation on the subject. Some people have played with planetarium programs around that date, and noticed that the winter solstice (December 21) Sun of 2012 aligns with part of the Cygnus Rift, a dark part of the Milky Way and have attached some significance to this date as a result.
What these people fail to recognize is that the winter solstice Sun will 'fall into' the Cygnus Rift every year for over a Century.”

“An alternative bit of related nonsense … states that the winter solstice Sun is in conjunction with the galactic equator in 2012. Not quite. This conjunction has already occurred in 1998, … and precession is now moving the winter solstice Sun further from the galactic equator.”

_more_ (select the '2012 Winter Solstice' link on the website's left-hand-side)


-----------------------------------------------------------
[ 1 ]

Actually there is little evidence that the Maya predicted any kind of destruction.
From my blog post :- End of the World in the Year 2012 ??
"These prophecies of doom really don't have any basis in what we know about the Maya," said Stephen Houston, a professor of anthropology at Brown University and a specialist of Maya hieroglyphic writing. "The Maya descriptions barely talk about this event." Instead, Houston said, the Maya saw their "long count" — the longest of their cyclical calendars — coming to an end in 2012 but also beginning anew on that date, without disastrous consequences. "Really, it's a conversion of people's anxieties about our times, and finding some remote mythological precedent or prediction of it," Houston said about the origins of the current 2012 myths.
See also :- Scientist Responds to 2012 End-of-World Hype
and :- A Nation of Conspiracy Theorists & 2012 End of World Hype
-----------------------------------------------------------
Wikipedia article :-
2012 Doomsday Prediction

What the Ancient Maya Tell Us About 2012 (very definitive)

.