Doomsday theories

[Dr. Awesome Face]

Important Note: So, I have to write a speech on doomsday theories, and I realised that I don't know all that many. If you coud help me out and tell me any that you know that would be a real help.

As for discussion value, what are the craziest doomsday theories youve ever heard and have their ever been any that you have believed?

 

[Marter]

Why, the one in <url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.226846-2-50-Reviews-Doomsday-2008>Doomsday, of course, is the best one I've heard. =D

Basically, a virus is wiping out part of the world, so other countries fence in that country in hopes to contain it. That country then becomes a wasteland.

 

[thethingthatlurks]

2012, obviously. I've heard everything from galactic radiation wiping us out due to the sun rising in the galactic center (from our perspective), to a reversal of the magnetic poles causing catastrophic storms, to an unknown planet (Nemesis, or Nibiru depending on who you ask) passing by too close to earth. Yeah, they're all batshit insane, but quite amusing. Anybody up for party on the morning of December 22nd, 2012?

 

[eggy32]

The sun will blow up a few billion years from now and the world will end. Eventually, long after the extinction of humans everything will continue to expand and on structures will break and the universe will fall apart.

 

[Dango]

That there will be no doomsday, because the starfish will come save us.

 

[Hero in a half shell]

Generally doomsday theories are governed by religion, each religion will have its own apocalypse scenario. (Christianity has basically the book of revelation, Vikings had Ragnorak) But with the expansion of the entertainment media many new doomsday theories have arisen in popular culture (zombie apocaylpse, meteorites) You could also mention the "Great Dissapointments" (When people expected the world to end on a particular day, and it didn't) There are also doomsday theories that are scientificly possible, but highly improbable and generally unknown about (gamma burst radiation I think is one)

Edit: In your speech you could talk about how doomsday scenarios have changed through time, from religious, based on faith, which held lots of fear and were widely believed and feared in a society, to popular culture, based on pseudo-science (2012) which is believed by some but not others in our culture, to scientific, which are understood, believed and lagely ignored. Just a thought I had, but you probably have a more suitable framework set up.

 

[-Drifter-]

Zombie apocalypse is the most ridiculous, I think. There aren't any I believe in though. Believing that there's going to be a doomsday seems like wishful thinking to me.

 

[Slaanax]

http://www.exitmundi.nl/

I want to turn into a floating cloud of little robot dudes.

 

[old account]

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn

 

[godofallu]

I personally believe that our reality is actually just a MMORPG, and one day the servers will shut down.

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

The craziest I've ever heard is that our universe is actually the size of a bacterial colony in another, vastly huge universe and that our universe has been under examination of vastly superior, gigantic aliens who are 80 billion times larger than our entire universe. The theory is that the aliens will inevitably step on us or blow us up somehow.

 

[Stammer]

The star Betelgeuse in the Orion Nebula is about to go supernova sometime between now and 100 years from now. It's significantly larger than our own sun but it's 640 light years away so it's a pretty small dot in our sky...

But when it blows, scientists theorize it's going to be like having a second Sun for about 2 weeks.

No one's ever commented on the doomsday possibilities behind this, but seriously... Either the entire earth could be completely boiled away or the radiation from the blast could make all life on earth feel like it just got hit by a nuclear weapon. Something to think about. And it actually has more credibility than "Dudes from an ancient civilization stopped making calendar dates for after 2012, so that means the world is going to end".

 

[Dr. Awesome Face]

Generally doomsday theories are governed by religion, each religion will have its own apocalypse scenario. (Christianity has basically the book of revelation, Vikings had Ragnorak) But with the expansion of the entertainment media many new doomsday theories have arisen in popular culture (zombie apocaylpse, meteorites) You could also mention the "Great Dissapointments" (When people expected the world to end on a particular day, and it didn't) There are also doomsday theories that are scientificly possible, but highly improbable and generally unknown about (gamma burst radiation I think is one)

Edit: In your speech you could talk about how doomsday scenarios have changed through time, from religious, based on faith, which held lots of fear and were widely believed and feared in a society, to popular culture, based on pseudo-science (2012) which is believed by some but not others in our culture, to scientific, which are understood, believed and lagely ignored. Just a thought I had, but you probably have a more suitable framework set up.

Yeah, that was pretty much what I was planning to do, thanks for mentioning Ragnarok I had missed that one in my opening.