"The pole shift will wipe us" claims one website, "the long count cycle ends by 2012 and so will you " says the other. Few other places re quote such armageddon prophecies. Lot others have done some extensive analysis on the Mayan calendar which ends on the coming December 21st of 2012. Maybe the Mayans had too much with it and simply gave up their calendar math at some point of time..

So are we in for a doom? Well .. its kind of possible to point out a much farther date scientifically, legend has it that in a couple more billion years or so the Sun's energy will start slowly receding and the earth will be the first to fall victim to the first micro degree temperature reduction casualty. What this means is the Earth will freeze up a ball, literally, waiting for the Sun to give up its Hydrogen slowly to grow and become a glowing red giant. At this stage the Sun will occupy half of the visible sky we have today and tolerating no more such celestial habiliments of such astronomical magnitudes, Earth will be charred and will be consumed by the enormously attractive forces of the Sun. Thankfully no life will exist that time to witness all these galactic events. Really.. some Armageddon this.

But 2012 or not, its seems extinction of life doesn't seem to be too far away with the rapid deterioration of the ecosystem around and the many such layers of "-spheres" above us. Yesterday I was reading this main article on Environment in "the Hindu" by a wild life scientist Kashmira Kakati.It talks of all those dense forest expanses that are rapidly disappearing and the species becoming extinct one by one.The author blames us, saying we are giving away our "delicate web of lives and in our modern conceit we have crushed the essence of life itself", to quote her exact words.

To say we have gained awareness is deficient. Growth and evolution are indispensable for survival but we have grown unchecked out of bounds that it seems we are seeding trails of destruction in our very own path of development.

"What a quirk of nature that amidst living this wealth we have been given neither the eye to appreciate it, nor the heart to care, nor even left with the memory of our collective inheritance" the article wonders. How true?

So is the world headed for an end? .. now there is some real doomsday prophesy I would like to quote from the Red Indian Chief's letter

"the perfumed flowers are our sisters ,

the deer , the horse, the great eagle, these are our brothers..

if all beasts were gone man would die from a great loneliness of spirit

For whatever happens to the beasts, soon happens to man"

The need for the hour is collective consciousness in each of our actions, to extend our stay here and just forget the d-days to come.