NASA has published a web video, titled “Why The World Didn’t End Yesterday,” in an effort to debunk the various myths and conspiracy theories surrounding the Mayan prophecy predicting the end of the world.
According to Michael Brody, the video’s producer and director, the video was developed in an effort to alleviate the onslaught of hundreds of frantic and threatening phone calls and emails NASA receives every day. NASA’s website dedicated to the Mayan prophecy has also received at least 4.6 million visitors inquiring about the “end of the world.”
“As the attention on the issue is growing, we didn’t want the rumors growing … The idea is to take a straight, stoic, standard [scientific] look… and give it a hook,” he said.
NASA attempts to dispel rumors that the end of the world will be caused by solar flares and the sun reaching the “max of its 11-year solar cycle,” pointing out that “the sun has been flaring for billions of years and it has never, once, destroyed the world.”
In fact, NASA claims, it’s the “wimpiest cycle” of the past 50 years.
The space agency’s website also states that another popular theory is that Nibiru, a “planet” discovered by the Sumerians, is headed directly toward Earth.
However, the video’s narrator explains, “if there was anything out there, like a planet headed for Earth, said NASA Astrobiologist David Morrison, it would already be one of the brightest objects in the sky … Everybody on Earth could see it.”
