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[Toady One]

I removed several of the mainstream religion report-magnet posts.  Please try to stay on target.

[Bauglir]

So nobody's heard that they've found more of the calendar? I mean, this is old news.

I can't see how that would matter. I mean, the belief that the world will end on that date is completely independent of any actual Mayan beliefs or prophecy. They're buying into a mythology whose history as a mythology is a fiction. Facts about anything historically accurate aren't even describing the same thing, so they're not really relevant.

[Cthulhu]

Yeah, let's be real.  If something as simple as basic facts about the Maya was enough to sway these people, we wouldn't even have this thread.

I think the reason why people buy into conspiracy theories is that they feel special, they know.

I've talked about this before a bit.  At least in America, I think a lot of conspiracy theories, especially those on the Right side of the spectrum (The recent "Mass shootings are a false flag to take away our guns" conspiracy theory would be a good example) come from America's roots in rebellion against a foreign power, and all that crazy rhetoric about trees and tyrants and blood.  On the left, we've got Vietnam and Nixon and Cheney and all that shit convincing people that the government's up to no good, and in the end you have a society that treats it as a matter of course that the government is no longer acting in society's best interests.  When that idea gets into the right kind of brain, you get conspiracy theories.

Post-catastrophe theories like these shooting ones, and 9/11, I think come from a just world hypothesis.  Long story short, people whose worldviews don't allow for absurdity attempt to recontextualize the event so there's a tangible bad guy who can be fought: the government.

[RedWarrior0]

I've said this before: Conspiracy theories are often a coping mechanism to deal with the fact that, frankly, the government sucks.

[RedWarrior0]

I've said this before: Conspiracy theories are often a coping mechanism to deal with the fact that, frankly, the government sucks.

...Often?

Depends on whether you consider the aliens building the pyramids nuts conspiracy theorists.

[miauw62]

CIAliens?

[DrPoo]

CIAliens?

CIAngelings

[Strife26]

I always thought that it was more of a matter of everyone really wanting the world to change from whatever their own status quo was, and the end of the world as we know is the biggest change of the status quo possible, right?

[Loud Whispers]

I always thought that it was more of a matter of everyone really wanting the world to change from whatever their own status quo was, and the end of the world as we know is the biggest change of the status quo possible, right?

Besides the universe changing?

[Darvi]

Destroy the universe! It changes everything!

[i2amroy]

So nobody's heard that they've found more of the calendar? I mean, this is old news.

It's not so much that they "found more" of the calendar, it's more that they finally found concrete evidence that the calendar continued to be circular in the larger digits. It's just like how our calendar didn't end when the year 999 ended, all we did was click over one digit and zero out the rest to get the year 1000. The end result is that this would have basically been one of the largest parties of the mayan time (similar to how we had a big party at the year 2000, but even larger) and probably still will be (considering there are still some villages in Mexico that worship the Maya gods).

The funny thing is that anybody who causes trouble about this won't be descended from the Maya since they actually know how the calendar works, instead of just thinking they do.

[Graknorke]

Also not having to accept responsibility for anything they've done. Large scale society things, but personal things too. It is pretty much a get out of jail free card for any moral choice, because the world was ending anyway.

[Strife26]

Now, what're the odds that enough people thinking and hoping that the world's going to end will have enough of an effect altering reality to actually end it?

[Graknorke]

Now, what're the odds that enough people thinking and hoping that the world's going to end will have enough of an effect altering reality to actually end it?

Depends how dedicated and violent they get about it.

[darkflagrance]

In imperial China, rebellions against the government often gained power from doomsday prophecies. One emperor even gained power as a result of a doomsday cult. However, by those points the situation was literally falling apart due to mass starvation and economic collapse.

Once the effect of climate change really get underway, and we see massive food shortages, violence, environmental disasters, collapse of cities, then I bet there will be quite a lot of appeal from doomsday cults willing to forecast an end date around which cultists can rally fanatically.