Since the beginning of time, mankind has been worried about end of time. Odd, right? We have as much time as life permits, and we waste time worrying about when that time will end. What with the media popularizing apocalyptic shows like The Walking Dead and Revolution, it seems like it might be hard to avoid all of this hype about the end of the world as we know it. I know I’ve found myself questioning the credit of these apocalypse theories. All of these, however, end with one resolution: why should I waste time worrying about it?

With Dec. 21, 2012 rapidly approaching, there are those who may experience a renewed fear of some kind of doomsday predicted for that date; I do not count myself among these people. There are several reasons I don’t find any merit in these predictions. For one, there have been so many failed doomsday predictions that it seems highly unlikely that one will come true. Granted, if we were to predict every single day was a doomsday, I’m sure we’d be right on some degree at some point in time. However, I find this both uninteresting and childish. One of the more recent failed apocalypse predictions was Y2K. Essentially, due to the fact that a new millenium was beginning, computers and other automated systems would freak out because the two digits representing the year (ie ‘99’ for the year ‘1999’) would no longer be correct because the assumed prefix would no longer be ‘19’, and this would cause many automated systems that relied upon dates to fail.  Long story short, the world didn’t end, automated systems didn’t fail, and nothing of any great magnitude happened.

This wasn’t even the first millennial doomsday prediction. In 1000 AD, Holy Roman Emperor Otto III latched onto an idea from 847, when a prophetess named Thiota claimed the second coming of Christ would occur in the year 1000. Otto III then assumed he was destined to combat the coming Antichrist. The result of ‘Y1K’? The world didn’t come to an end.

I think this is all a little hilarious, as well as a little disappointing. Hilarious because people are freaking out about something that hasn’t actually happened despite several predictions. Disappointing because there are other people out there who will waste their time with this junk. I hate to make it sound like I despise all doomsday-sayers, but it does seem foolish to me to waste time with these kinds of things.

And what of 2012? What about the Mayan calendar? Well, there’s no way to say that it will or won’t happen, though NASA seems pretty convinced it won’t. NASA has denied most doomsday predictions, from the Mayan calendar to a so-called Planet X or Nibiru or Eris. They mention that, similar to any calendar, the Mayan calendar simply comes to an end, much like today’s calendars: they come to an end on Dec. 31, with no major, Earth-shaking implications. As for Planet X and Nibiru and Eris: these are large space objects (planets, brown dwarves, etc.) that were predicted to collide with Earth on or around Dec. 21. NASA doubts that this will happen due to the fact that, if a large space object were on some kind of collision course, they or some other organization would have been tracking its movement for at least a decade, and by now it would likely be visible to the naked eye. Eris, while a real planet, cannot come within (roughly) four billion miles of Earth.

To be honest, I am extremely sceptical of some kind of cataclysmic event happening within my lifetime. Not to sound as though I have some kind of disdain for those who do believe this, but really? There have been so many “doomsdays” that turned out to be no more than some weird or crazy prophecy that didn’t deliver, so I just don’t see any point in wasting time thinking about the end of the world. But who knows? Come Dec. 21, I could be proven wrong. But until then, I don’t think I’ll waste any more time worrying about when the world will end.