Am looking for good source to debunk 2012 for teenagers

Ladewig

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Ladewig
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Dec 4, 2001
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A friend of mine works with at-risk youth and this year they latched onto 2012 end time prophecies (two years ago it was Kevin Trudeau). I am looking for a good internet source for explaining that the Mayan calandar is not a useful predictor of events.

I tried Skepdic.com/Maya but the writing style is a bit much for these kids.

Any advice?
 
What's wrong with that site? any person with a 6th grade reading level should understand that the page, is basically stating, that 2012 will pass along into 2013 without a hitch.
 
I think Bad Astronomy had a few blog entries about it, specifically debunking the magnetic pole shift and galactic alignment nonsense. Give me a few minutes to search, unless Phil himself gets on here and does it for me.
 
Arus808 said:
What's wrong with that site? any person with a 6th grade reading level should understand that the page, is basically stating, that 2012 will pass along into 2013 without a hitch.
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Unfortunately, many teenagers do not have a 6th grade reading level.
 
Arus808 said:
What's wrong with that site? any person with a 6th grade reading level should understand that the page, is basically stating, that 2012 will pass along into 2013 without a hitch.
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After reading your post, I thought I might have been off in my estimation, so I went back and read it again. I still think the style is too much for these kids. They will neither recognize nor understand the embedded reference notes. They will not understand why three paragraphs quoting an astrologer can be dismissed with a single line:

SkepDic said:
Any astronomer will probably also tell you that an alignment between our sun and any particular point in the Milky Way will just bring another day in paradise here on planet Earth.
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To them that will appear as merely a "he said/she said" argument. They have no framework to distinguish statements from astrologers from statements from astronomers.
 
Ladewig said:
To them that will appear as merely a "he said/she said" argument. They have no framework to distinguish statements from astrologers from statements from astronomers.
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If they don't know the difference between astronomy and astrology, perhaps that would be a good place to start? If that is still too much teach the the difference between 'real useful science' and 'completely made up'.
 
Ladewig said:
After reading your post, I thought I might have been off in my estimation, so I went back and read it again. I still think the style is too much for these kids. They will neither recognize nor understand the embedded reference notes. They will not understand why three paragraphs quoting an astrologer can be dismissed with a single line:



To them that will appear as merely a "he said/she said" argument. They have no framework to distinguish statements from astrologers from statements from astronomers.
Click to expand...

then i would suggest that you start with a basic science book that illustrates what astronomy is, and what an astronomer does. Take a trip to the local planetarium.

If your "teenagers" are this out of touch with science, then jumping into trying to explain 2012 to them is too much of a leap.

Start with 4th grade science first. And also, give them a course in 4th grade English and how to reference other reports and why its done.
 
Are these teenagers having some sort of difficulty understanding the notion of a cycle? I mean, do they freak out each year as December 31 approaches? Do they go to bed each night in fear the world will end while they sleep?
 
daSkeptic said:
Are these teenagers having some sort of difficulty understanding the notion of a cycle? I mean, do they freak out each year as December 31 approaches? Do they go to bed each night in fear the world will end while they sleep?
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They have watched 2012 "documentaries" on television. These shows claim that the end of the long count is not part of a recurring cycle, but rather the end. These TV programs and some internet sites are their only sources on this topic. Given that large numbers of adults believe in this 2012 nonsense, it is easy to see how teenagers might buy into the hype. There is no need to be condescending.
 
Arus808 said:
then i would suggest that you start with a basic science book that illustrates what astronomy is, and what an astronomer does. Take a trip to the local planetarium.

If your "teenagers" are this out of touch with science, then jumping into trying to explain 2012 to them is too much of a leap.
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Perhaps you are right. A few years ago I gave a talk to the teenagers being served by my friend's social service agency about why 9/11 was not an inside job. I had to start with the basics such as how does one evaluate sources and what counts as evidence. Given that the 2012 stuff has morphed from Mayan artifact to some new-agey philosophy which misuses actual astronomical terms, starting with an explanation of how science works might easily be the best approach.

Start with 4th grade science first. And also, give them a course in 4th grade English and how to reference other reports and why its done.
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Because these kids go to schools in poorer neighborhoods they are not exposed to the best and most knowledgeable science teachers. One science teacher tried to explain condensation on the outside of a ice-filled glass by claiming that glass was porous. These kids most certainly did not learn how to reference reports and sources in the 4th grade.
 
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You might want to suggest to them that since the Maya were so good at predicting the future, why did they miss the bit about their own destruction at the hands of the Portuguese?

From their own standpoint, this would have been a pretty important part of the future.

Norm
 
I'm 50% Portuguese and I'm greatly offended.

Ok, I'm not really. But I am interested in details on the recurring cycle vs. "the end" stuff. I also had read/saw on TV a few times it being described as the absolute end point.
 
Whiplash said:
Ok, I'm not really. But I am interested in details on the recurring cycle vs. "the end" stuff. I also had read/saw on TV a few times it being described as the absolute end point.
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It is the absulute end point... of this baktun. One thing Ladewig could do is ask these kids if the world came to an end in 1618. - the last time a baktun cycled over.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayan_calendar_end#2012_and_the_Long_Count

I learned an interesting thing about the Mayan Calendar from Collapse. They didn't actually "start" their history with the beginning of the first baktun. Their legendary history began in the 8th*.

*IIRC. Need to verify.
 
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As a different tack, couldn't you give them a looooong list of other end of the world predictions (I don't think any have been correct yet). There must be hundreds. That might be an easy way of giving them some context for this without having to get heavy with the astronomy.
 
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