Eclectic Dreck said:
To be fair, the best explanation for the existance of the moon is collision with a body the size of mars several billion years ago. Generally speaking however, a planet "hiding behind jupiter" would have been noticed. Either through direct observation (unless some incredibly bizarre orbit means that jupiter has always concealed it from sight) or through induction (even a small planet would have a notable impact on the solar system).
Apologies if I've misunderstood or am ill-informed, but I don't believe that the creation of the moon has any relevance to the 2012 hype. It's certainly true and clear, even to those who rarely pay attention to science, that large cosmic bodies have in the past influenced one another and continue to do so (though less dramatically). There is little doubt in my mind that, under the current working scientific hypotheses, if a gigantic mobile object collided with the earth then the force exerted could indeed fracture the earth so as to create another distinct cosmic body (like the moon, given time to coalesce).
However, whilst all this astronomy and physics is very interesting, this doesn't appear to relate to either the 2012 hype in general or my own personal argument with my classmate. Just to fill you in on the details, 'Nibiru' (or Planet X, they're the same thing in this ridiculous farce of a theory) is at least 4 times greater than the size of the earth, yet, seemingly by magic since it defies the laws of physics, is hiding behind Jupiter without disrupting Jupiter's trajectory or creating any anomalies in observed magnetic fields. However, again, seemingly by magic, it will fly out past Jupiter within the next couple of years on some form of hyper-retarded version of gravity assist (slingshot effect) and either hit or glance Earth, causing either a geomagnetic reversal or direct impact, whichever will cause more panic in the target audience (so, usually, geomagnetic reversal because if, like most people, the audience has never heard of such a thing it sounds catastrophic, cars floating up in the air as if by volition, people frantically tugging at the slowly inverting crust of the earth whilst mourning the fact that Nibiru hadn't just killed them outright with a collision, cursing their foolishness for rebuking the conspiracy theorists,
"if only they'd believed them!!!" etc). It's an absurd theory and I find it incredibly annoying, especially the fact that so many people are taking seriously (I know of several
teachers who've openly admitted to fearing 2012, one of whom attended Cambridge medical; I guess people have to fear something).