Free The Real History of the End of the World by Sharan Newman Page B

scientists, who know that one day the sun will use up its fuel, who still hypothesize that humanity will figure out a way to colonize another planet before that happens.
    Therefore I have selected representative groups and influential writers or leaders of apocalyptic or millennial movements, such as people who believed their leader to be the Messiah, or a prophet, who would build a heaven on earth or give them a free pass to the real heaven; those who thought that the thousand years of happiness would start if they helped it along with military force; and those who thought that we were at the end of the thousand years and braced themselves in various ways to survive the horrors of the final battles and breakdown of society before the final judgment.
    The reader may be surprised to know how many mainstream religions today began as millennial movements that later adapted their dogma to living in a world that didn’t end when expected.
    I also included some people and groups that fascinate me. Although most of them did not leave lasting memorials or establish religions that still exist, they reflect the myriad ways that humans have interpreted their own times as apocalyptic. It is also intriguing to consider why most people muddle on through good times and bad without ever assuming that the end is upon them while a small but intense segment of society feels compelled to fix the time and prepare for it, sometimes in terribly destructive ways.
    However, this is not a book of sociology or psychology. I looked at a number of theoretical studies on the reasons behind millennial movements, charismatic leaders, and doomsday cults. I would always find exceptions to the conclusions. So as a historian, I’ve simply tried to record, as accurately as possible, how humankind has anticipated the end of the world in various ways.
    Here and there in this work, I mention the upcoming prediction that the world will end on the winter solstice of 2012. I did some work on the ideas that the poles will flip, or that there will be catastrophic solar flares, or that a galactic alignment will occur that will signal some great upheaval. I haven’t found a clear explanation for what. None of these things seems to be of serious concern.
    For instance, the magnetic poles wander about all the time within a certain radius, never far from the geographic pole. a But they don’t move together. The North Pole is moving toward Siberia at about fifty kilometers a year. The South Pole is heading northwest at about five kilometers. I have been assured that they will not end up making snow in Ethiopia. b I love the idea of independent poles, each setting out on its own adventure. What is even more amazing is that the movement of the magnetic poles has been known since the 1600s. It’s only recently that the fact has been dragged out to join the list of scary things that might happen in 2012. Now, some people say that the poles aren’t just going to wobble; they’ll reverse, so south will be north and north will be south. Birds won’t know where to migrate; planes won’t be able to navigate. It does seem that north and south trade places every so often. But there’s a lot of debate about when, where, and how long it would take, never mind what the effects might be. It’s not high on my list of worries.
    Solar flares can be a problem with power plants and other technology, and scientists are saying we may have a lot of them around 2012, but the last round was just a few years ago and the world didn’t end then. But there’s no point in trying to refute each of these 2012 end-of-world theories individually because there’s always a new one coming up. However, I do make a point of giving the background on the Maya, the Hopi, and Nostradamus, whose supposed prophecies tend to be cited most often. I heard the other day that the Mother Shipton, invented by a journalist in the eighteenth century, had predicted the end in