Is the world ending today? Probably not but the Maya Long Count Calendar is.

above, a Maya cave ceremony at Naj Tunich, Guatemala

December 20 2012 marks the end of the current Maya Long Count calendar. So will the world end tonight? Well the calendar certainly does and it is an extraordinarily long calendar. The current calendar started August 11, 3114 BCE. So what happens tomorrow?

Fire and Brimstone? Planet X colliding with the earth? Instagram seizing user identities? Other unspeakable horrors?

Don't be too concerned. Tomorrow we enter the 14th b'ak'tun, the 14th Maya long count calendar. Just like on January 1st we enter 2013. In all my work with the Maya no one ever suggested that the world would end at midnight tonight. The modern Maya don't seem worried about the end of the world. Plus there is no evidence of world wide destruction at the end of the last b'ak'tun, or the one before that, or the one before that.

Even without the end of the long count there is plenty to be worried about in the world. It would be easy to be pessimistic about the coming 14th b'ak'tun. The issues facing the world are huge. But I am hopeful. 

I am hopeful that we can figure out how to feed and care for 7 Billion people.

I am hopeful that we can finally face global warming.

I am hopeful that people in the United States who disagree will start talking to each other.

Those are challenges that we have to face new calendar or not.

above, the doorway to the underworld temple 22 Copan, Honduras

Now I might be wrong. After all it looks like the Instagram thing has already happened. In that case my advice is to relax and enjoy your remaining moments. It will all be over in a few hours.

Stephen Alvarez

Sewanee, TN