As the date Dec. 21, 2012 draws nearer, people around the world are becoming very weary of the troubled times that are predicted to come. How did this devastating prediction come to be? What should we be expecting? What evidence is there that it will or will not happen? These are just a few questions that some people may have.

The Maya, an ancient civilization in Mexico and Central America, are the society that had foreseen the inevitable doomsday. Better known Mayan locations are Chichineza and Guatemala. Ancient Mayan astrologists were frightfully accurate, just by watching the sky night after night, they could predict when the next storms were coming.

One major observation they had made was the slow shift of the Milky Way  and the center of the galaxy moving closer and closer to the horizon over 200 years ago. Although the Mayans were the people to make the calendars, they were not the only ones to predict the chaos that eventually would be forced upon the Earth.

Nostradamus, a French pharmacist, had also predicted it in the 16th century. He had foretold the consequences of a massive comet or planet crashing into the Earth that would cause great devastation.

Over the years, there have been many theories about the end of the world. There were 3 views on how the world would end just from the Mayans alone; aligning of the planets, polar shifts and the end of the 5th cycle.

The planets aligning for the first time could create the biggest solar flare that the sun has ever given off. The solar flare would have the effect of a freak forest fire on a much greater scale. It would rip through the cities and towns leaving nothing untouched.

Polar shifts are extreme climate changes in a short period of time. The Quelccaya Ice Cap, in the Andes mountains of Peru, is a good example of a polar shift. The largest ice cap in the tropics has vegetation still growing under it.

The only way that would be possible, is if the ice had formed almost overnight. The estimated time that the ice cap had formed was around the time that the 4th cycle in Mayan time had ended and the 5th cycle had started.

It is believed that the 13 gods had split time into 5 cycles. Each cycle had different life forms with humans being the most suited to survive than the rest. The end of the 5th cycle is supposedly on Dec. 21, 2012.

There are many approaches to how the world is going to end. There can be a range from extraterrestrial beings to the great advances of technology, or even natural and interstellar catastrophes. There have also been theories that along the last few days leading up to the apocalypse, there will be worldwide devastation.

There are many rumors to how some parts of the apocalypse have started, but how many of them are true?

While looking at this from a biblical standpoint, it is said that the animals will pay for the sins of man. For an unknown reason; pilot whales, harp seals and millions of fish were washing up on the shores all around the world. Birds were dropping out of the sky like rain drops in towns around the United States and Europe.

In a poll of a total of 83 MTHS students, 63 believe that the world will not end, while on the other hand, 10 people thought that it would. There were 12 people that either didn’t care or thought that it was possible.

One of the most popular concepts is the idea of the zombie apocalypse. Some believe that the zombie apocalypse has already begun because of the incidents that have happened around the United States in the past couple of  months.

There have been many accounts of cannibalism in the worlds history, but never as much as we have had in the past year in urban communities. Most people had heard about the supposed zombie attack that happened around the end of May in Miami, Florida. Some people are so terror-stricken that they have actually started making survival kits to aid them in the possible journey ahead.

Mckenna Hunt, a sophomore, said “I don’t really believe it’s gonna happen but I kinda want it to happen, like the zombies anyway, that will be pretty sick.”

Something that most people don’t know about the Mayan was that the calendar did not end in 2012. The Mayans had not accounted for leap years, so with that logic, the world allegedly was going to end in February 2012. “I was on a Mexico trip last year and I was at the Mayan ruins and they had a sign that, it was a big sign and it said on December 21, 2012, the world will not end, the Mayan calendar just resets and that’s why, I don’t think it will end, it will just, the year will just reset.” said freshman Liya Ewing.

Whether the theories are true or not, it will not be tested until 12:01 AM on Dec 21, 2012.