Can numbers tell the future?

Posted: Thursday, March 19, 2009 6:46 PM by Alan Boyle

Summit Entertainment

Click for video: In this scene from the movie
"Knowing," Nicolas Cage explains how a list of
numbers predicts future disasters.

"Knowing," the Nicolas Cage movie opening Friday, is the latest Hollywood tale to play off the idea that our future is already determined by the numbers, if only we knew how to interpret them. Does the universe really work that way? The answer is no ... yes ... maybe.

If you think you can predict the dates of future disasters by checking numbers on a piece of paper, as Cage's character does in the movie, you might want to consider seeing a therapist. But if you think you're seeing the same plot twist happening over and over again, it's not all in your head.

Numbers with cosmic significance have played a big role in movies such as "Pi" (which is a take-off on the Bible Code fad) and "The Number 23" (actually, my personal favorite is the number 42). Numerological voodoo is a theme in the "Lost" TV show (see? 42!). And sometimes that voodoo translates into real-life worries: For example, the bogus doomsday claims about 2012 stem from the numbers behind the ancient Maya calendar.

There's some powerful psychology behind numerology, in fiction as well as real life. And when it comes to physics, numbers are real life.

With the right theory, knowing one set of numbers can tell you what a future set of numbers could be, MIT theoretical physicist Edward Farhi says. "Physics is really the business of taking numbers, the values and attributes of things, turning a crank, which is our theory, and arriving at new numbers which predict what will happen in the future," Farhi told me this week.

Cranking out the numbers
For example, engineers can crank out numbers to predict where NASA's New Horizons spacecraft will be in 2015 (somewhere around Pluto, we hope) or where the Cassini orbiter will be in 2017 (still checking out Saturn's moons, if scientists have their way). Closer to home, if you saw two trains barreling toward each other, at a certain point you can say there'll be a collision with as much confidence as Cage could in "Knowing."

"It gets much more complicated when we try to predict complicated things," Farhi said. "Really, what we're talking about is where you draw the line."

That's where the "maybe" part comes in: A century ago, predicting the weather a week or more in advance might have seemed like than voodoo - but with better monitoring systems and sophisticated computer modeling, we take that kind of weather forecast totally for granted. Farhi predicted that future technological advances will lead to better predictions as well.

"There are two avenues to prediction: One is to have a really good idea that helps you, and the other is just to increase computer power," he said. A truer-to-life model for a particular phenomenon, backed up by higher-powered modeling software, will lead to more accurate predictions.

Predictions in the office pool
That applies to weather forecasting, but it can also apply to economic and social forecasting as well. You don't have to look any further than this month's "March Madness" college basketball tournament, which began today, to see how improved computer modeling can contribute to the prediction game.

Farhi is working on the computer-power side of the prediction equation, by working out the theoretical underpinnings for quantum computing. In 20 years or so, when quantum computers are finally ready for prime time, that could bring a ... well, you know what kind of leap in computing that could bring.

The first applications for quantum data processing would include decrypting secret codes and encrypting communications and designing more efficient networks. But some researchers say quantum computers also could be used to solve puzzles ranging from Sudoku games to molecular-scale construction, and bring computer modeling to a higher level.

Quantum computers could outdo traditional computers when it comes to simulating chemical reactions on the molecular level, but Farhi is reluctant to push his prophetic powers any farther than that. "I'd love to be able to predict what we're going to be able to predict in 200 years," he said.

Cheating on the causality exam
One thing seems to be certain: You couldn't time-travel into the future and then come back with an ironclad prediction, even though that's another common theme in science-fiction movies.

In a sense, we're all traveling into the future - and according to the theory of relativity, you could even control the pace of your "travel" into the future by accelerating to near the speed of light. "What doesn't seem to be OK is to go back in time," Farhi said.

All sorts of potential paradoxes could arise, such as the famous "killing your grandfather" paradox. "The laws of physics seem to avoid that," Farhi said. "They don't want that to happen. So traveling backward in time does not seem to be OK. ... If the knowledge in the movie about things that happen comes from a trip to the future, followed by a return trip, I would say that goes beyond conventional science."

Phew! Glad we got that settled. Feel free to chime in below with your own thoughts about numerology and science, the "Knowing" movie, the buzz over 2012 or your "March Madness" predictions.

For more from Farhi and Hollywood physics, check out this item about quantum teleportation and the movie "Jumper." And for an in-depth discussion of how real life differs from the movies, consult "Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics."

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Comments

It always comes down to the simple fact that TIME is a man-made device...it exists nowhere else except in our minds...how can it possibly have any real cosmic effect?
With what I have seen of the way History is recorded, our chances of knowing the truth about the future is right up there with the truth about the past...a crap shoot...in a realm that doesn't really exist.
Alan...my fave number has always been 47...what's the significance?

steve smyth (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 7:28 PM)

we can analyze the butt of an atom, but respsect of God all mighty eludes this world. Someone ever here of the term darkness?

new york ny (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 7:39 PM)

Hey! My horoscope said I would read something interesting today.

Ave in East Los Angeles (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 8:03 PM)

It would be nice to have numbers worked backwards through time, to scale what would have been inevitable or not, so as to correlate those numbers/events with corresponding numbers/events. In a sense that would bring (in my own humble opinion!) a greater understanding of where we have come from based on factual numbered occurrences which reflect what has been written in history. The prediction of the future has long soured many civilizations into beliefs so far-fetched (according to current scientific data) but (in my own humble opinion!) could potentially be possible if we understand the starting point. It's very hard to delve into the middle of numbers when you're not sure they started, as is the case in coding! Just a few thoughts!

Rob (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 8:50 PM)

Years ago my office had a bracket pool on the super-bowl (similar to the one used so often on basketball). I knew very little about many of the teams, so I used the numerology method of picking the winner of each game in the bracket. Simply wrote out each teams city and name, e.g., Cleveland Browns, and then determined the numerology total. I selected the team with the highest value as the winner of that game. It worked for every game up to the super bowl. At which point there was me and one other player left. Several days before the super bowl he offered to split winnings. After several weeks of getting every game right I felt that I had just figured out how to pick any football game, so declined his offer. As expected he won, I lost and have never bet on a game since.

Rich Lentz, Omaha, NE (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 8:51 PM)

Alan, I respect most things you write and look forward to reading what you post,
but I have to say that when it comes to references, you might want take a closer look before you endorse them.

"For example, the bogus doomsday claims about 2012 stem from the numbers behind the ancient Maya calendar."

Many people have watered down the true meaning of 2012, so much like many other ancient texts are and continue to be.
The part about a doomsday scenario about 2012 being "bogus" or just a
"...trendy theory is a largely Internet-based rumor..."is laughable - especially when someone references the "Entertainment" section by the "Associated Press," because we all know that the editors for the entertainment section by the "Associated Press" have extensive knowledge of historical facts that could very well lead to...well...Google.

In your defense, I will admit that I do not have a doctorate in Mayan history, and that I use Google.

First, the date is wrong (in your first reference) it is December 21, 2012, not the 22nd. Secondly, you - someone known
to post known facts about science - referenced something that has only two paragraphs giving information about 2012. Three, there is nothing regarding the amazing(exact) predicting that we(Earth)will be in alignment with our galactic center on that day by the Mayan people. Four, that you gave a reference to people not associated with science and the work you endorse. Fifth, you gave a reference to some one of science, a Dr. Ian O'Neill who says

"Up to this point, the Mayan Calendar may have sounded a little archaic - after all,
it was possibly based on religious belief, the menstrual cycle,
mathematical calculations using the numbers 13 and 20 as the base units and a heavy mix of astrological myth.The only principal correlation with the modern calendar is the Haab' that recognized there were 365 days in one solar year (it's not clear whether the Mayans accounted for leap years). The answer to a longer calendar could be found in the "Long Count", a calendar lasting 5126 years."

The problem with this? "the menstrual cycle" he must be talking about the 260 day - nine month "gestation cycle"in which humans are created. If the menstrual cycle is one of the Mayas references to time..they must know something that even Doctors today do not. As well as the problem of "(it's not clear whether the Mayans accounted for leap years)"in which I was not aware that the Mayan's had months...like February. Lastly with this 2008, uncompleted thought, bad reference - "Long Count", a calendar lasting 5126 years" it lasts just about 5125 years, not 5126.

Sixth, one of Dr. O'Neill's references is...Wikipedia. Really? Wikipedia? I wasn't aware that it was a website that I could have used on my research exams in college.

Honestly, we could all have it wrong, and right now you and others could be looking at this and writing down how wrong I am; and I hope that it turns out to be that way. Like I said, I do not have a doctorate in Mayan history.Who can really say they knew the true intentions of the Mayans way of life, so much so, that they can boast facts that are not disputable? It is almost like someone saying they know the exact meaning of the Bible(besides God itself.)

All I am trying to say is, stating your opinion is one thing, but referencing those who either have it wrong,or do not have the backing to support their or your own claims, is skating on thin ice. Not to mention that one of the first things you learn in college English, even high school English, is that you never reference something that can frankly - make you seem like a complete idiot. In the end, those references can be viewed as a reflection on your own intelligence(which I am not attacking.)

George - Washington D.C (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 8:58 PM)

I've have always been "tuned " into numbers but what really brought it into my "awareness" is when my father passed on and I was helping my mother with her finances,i.e.0 checkbook, I noticed my father had been depositing monthly from an Ira 3300.00 . As I was seeing the frequency of this deposit it "hit " me that he had indeed been writing his deathdate 3/3/00.

Deb Haugom, Milton, Wi (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 9:10 PM)

It says here that "Physics is about learning the numbers so you can tell the numbers in the future by turning a crank"
What I want to know, from today's Crank who is going to be our Crank tomorrow?

Frank Lornitzo, Bradford, Vermont (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 9:27 PM)

I've heard it said that if we knew the position and energy of every particle in the universe we could predict the future. That would reduce the universe to a near infinite set of dominos. We could just look down the line and know which ones would fall and when. What this idea does to free will is another question altogether.

Mike, Long Island, NY (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 10:42 PM)

Deb, with absolutely no disrespect, could that have been mere coincidence?

John (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 11:23 PM)

So do you think we will get to the point where Issac Asimov's Foundation Trilogy will be a reality?

David Secor, Grayslake, IL (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 11:40 PM)

The first message posted indicates a belief that "time" is a man-made concept that really doesn't exitst. This is categorically false.

Time is a difficult concept to be sure, but it really boils down to time simply being the unit of measurement for change. Since our universe (and literally every particle in it has been in a constant state of change since the moment of the Big Bang, and that rate of change can be measured in a quantifiable way, then time does indeed exist as a real entity.

Now, consider that Einstein's theories say that there are 4 dimensions that we exist in: 3 spatial dimensions and one time dimension called space-time. This theory works because of the postulation that time is a real concept.

Scott M. (Sent Thursday, March 19, 2009 11:44 PM)

The reason the Mayan calendar "prediction" is laughable is that it is claimed to be a prediction that history will end in 2012, because the Mayan calendar ends then, when the Earth, sun, and galactic center align. Is it or is it not true that such an alignment is cyclical (every 25,000 years or so)? If so, then why did the universe not end every 25,000 years? How are we here to get hysterical over this?
The Mayan calendar runs out in 2012 because (a) the Maya ran out of stone, or(b) the stone carver quit or went on strike, or (c) they got that far just before their civilization collapsed.

Norman Fields, Bullhead City, AZ (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 12:21 AM)

TIMING IS GOOD ACCOUNTING DAILY LIFE
IN THE COURSES OF THE SUN & THE MOON
EACH NUMBER RELATED FOR THE RESPECTIVE TIME
OF EACH ACTIVTY
IN PRAYER, WORKING & RESTING HOURS ETC.
WHAT THE RUSH OF PREDICTING THE UNKNOWN FUTURE?
AND UNBALANCE THE PRESENT BY MISSUSING THE NUMBERS.
THE TRUTH IS ALWAYS RIGHT HERE *INSTANTLY*
IN MAKING SUM OF GOOD-POINTS
TO ENSURE THE BEST PLACE IN THE ULTIMATE HOME
OF THE CELEST GARDEN.
FOR A START DO ACQUIRE THE RIGHT NUMBERS!

Najma, P-L, Mauritius (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 1:08 AM)

The volume of scientific ignorance in these comments is astounding. No wonder this country is on the decline: we're populated with scientific illiterates.

Hint: if you don't know what you're talking about (and many of you, above, don't), say nothing. You'll seem much more intelligent that way.

Christopher A., Seattle, WA (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 1:11 AM)

scott m...theories and postulations are just that...find me one other entity or being that recognizes time...it's Humanity's means of recording the passing of...you guessed it...TIME!
oh, yeah...easy on the 'our universe' bit...think about that one!

steve smyth (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 2:00 AM)

All I have to say is Good by and Thanks for all the fish!!

Paul WI (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 2:37 AM)

Really enjoyed your trip down nostalgia lane with your reference to the now obscure Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy.

Did you?

Oh, and I really gotta tell you, Norman, that there are several references to that date in December of 2012... even in the I Ching. So, even if the Mayan wrote 15,000 pages of calendar after the last one we found, odds are there's going to be some movin' and a-shakin' then anyway.

:D

TomW, Chicago, Il. (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 2:48 AM)

Yes, I really did enjoy bringing up the answer to the ultimate question (42) ... in part because I played a small role in getting an asteroid named after the late author of "Hitchhiker's Guide," Douglas Adams:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6867061/

... And in part because 42 was Fox Mulder's apartment number in "The X-Files." To this day I have an "I Want to Believe" poster hanging in my office, and at one time "Face on Mars" author Richard Hoagland saw fit to mention me and Mulder on the same Web page:

http://www.enterprisemission.com/tension.htm

... So you're absolutely right that one little number, 42, is my entry pass to Nostalgia Lane.

:-D

Alan Boyle (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 2:55 AM)

Heisenberg's Uncertainly principle discovered 60 years says one can never know the exact momentum and position of a particle. We can only talk about probabilities. The fact that we "look" at an electron changes the state of the electron itself. If we hadn't looked at the electron, the state would have been different.

To me, that says a lot about predicting the future. We can predict, but only in simple mathematical systems. When it comes to chaos theory/quantum mechanics, we can only talk about probabilities.

Rakesh Sharma (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 3:22 AM)

I'm interested in the 2012 thing, & I have a few different thoughts about that & comments above. 1-Perhaps there is a slight difference in exactly the positions or environment, or SOME variation that didn't happen the last time or few that Earth, Sun, & center of our galaxy aligned. I read somewhere it will have something to do with strong photons from the galaxy center. 2- Time. I agree with Scott. And some who want to sound all spiritual say time is an illusion. BUT time can only be an illusion in a non-physical dimension, which must be a dimension where there is no seperateness of beings or of energies, & nothing to experience- otherwise, time will still exist there too. 3- The mayan calendar- maybe it means something special for us, or maybe they realized they had to end it SOMEWHERE, or someone would still be adding to it daily now. BTW, I haven't seen anywhere that peeps think the whole Universe will be affected, just Earth. I do wish I knew now exactly what will happen in 2012. I hate surprizes! lol

Judy L. Portland, Oregon (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 3:25 AM)

Saying the Mayans predicted the end of the world in 2012 since their calander ends then is similar to future humans assuming we predicted the end of the world after the year 9999 since we only use 4 digit years in our calendar. The Mayans couldn't even predict their own end much less theirs. If they knew the future they would have killed the few members of the first landing ships. Easy to do since over a million can easily kill a few dozen exploers.

Steve Courton, Dallas, Texas (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 4:06 AM)

I can tell you what time it is, but can you tell me what time is?

Don, Oklahoma City (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 6:22 AM)

All 12 of the ORIGINAL Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" episodes are available as an MP3 at:

http://cid-0493e421824a27f2.skydrive.live.com/browse.aspx/HitchHikersGuideToTheGalaxy

As the Sirius Cybernetics Company says, "Share and enjoy."

Jym Allyn (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 6:37 AM)

Has anyone thought that the year 2012 is a metaphor and does not refer to an historical event? I think in that case a lot more studying of Mayas mythology would be appropriate.

Thomas Bankston, Vicenza, Italy (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 6:50 AM)

I had a numerology analysis done of my name, birthdate, place of birth, time of birth, etc., along with astrology and it described me perfectly.

Laurence Topliffe, Fairfield, Iowa (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 8:08 AM)

Could someone please tell me the numbers for next weeks lotto and I will give you half the prize...

schrodinger/s cat (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 8:17 AM)

While there are some interesting reads, I believe most people who have commented don't really know much about the Mayan's or time. For this reason I will clarify so people are a little more informed and then they can make their crazy assumptions about 2012 and time.

The Tzolkin is a 260-day calendar based around the period of human gestation. It is composed of 20 day-signs, each of which has 13 variations, and was (and still is) used to determine character traits and time harmonics, in a similar way to Western astrology. The Maya also used a 365-day calendar called the Haab, and a Venus calendar, plus others. They measured long time periods by means of a Long Count, in which one 360-day year (a "Tun"), consists of 18 x 20-day "months" ("Uinals"). Twenty of these Tuns is a Katun; 20 Katuns is a Baktun (nearly 400 years); and 13 Baktuns adds up to a "Great Cycle" of 1,872,000 days, ( 5200 Tuns, or about 5125 years).

Mayan scholars have been attempting to correlate the Long Count with our Western Gregorian calendar, since the beginning of this century. There has been massive variation in the suggested correlations, but as early as 1905, Goodman suggested a correlation only 3 days from the most popular one today. Known as the GMT correlation, or "correlation # 584283", this was finalized in 1950, and puts the start of the Great Cycle ( day 0.0.0.0.0) on 11th August 3114 BC, and the end-date (known as 13.0.0.0.0.) as 21st December 2012.

Jose Arguelles has pointed out that the Tzolkin is a harmonic of the Great Cycle, and can be used to map history, as if it is measuring not individual gestation but species gestation, since 5 Great Cycles add to exactly 26,000 Tuns; the "Grand Year" or precession of the equinoxes - a higher harmonic of 260.

NOTE: The astronomer Philip Plait has stated very clearly that the Mayan calendar does not end in 2012 at all, that it is like the odometer on your car, as each section of the odometer reaches 9 and then clicks over to 0, the next number to it starts a new cycle, so that when all the numbers again reach 0 all the way across the odometer - the last number will change from 1 to 2 and the new cycle starts all over again. This is also what history scholars believe.

When it comes to polar shifts and magnetic reversal, I am not sure but I do believe we will find out. Someone stated that just by looking at an electron changes it and while that is just as true as finding what is most probable. Only time will tell.

Time on the other hand is not as complicated. While it is a man made tool for measurement it indeed has impact and is as concrete as me typing right now.

Time is a component of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify the motions of objects. Time has been a major subject of religion, philosophy, and science, but defining time in a non-controversial manner applicable to all fields of study has consistently eluded the greatest scholars.[2]

“ The Moving Finger writes: and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit,
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it. … Omar Khayyám
”

In physics and other sciences, time is considered one of the few fundamental quantities.[3] Time is used to define other quantities – such as velocity – and defining time in terms of such quantities would result in circularity of definition.[4] An operational definition of time, wherein one says that observing a certain number of repetitions of one or another standard cyclical event (such as the passage of a free-swinging pendulum) constitutes one standard unit such as the second, is highly useful in the conduct of both advanced experiments and everyday affairs of life. The operational definition leaves aside the question whether there is something called time, apart from the counting activity just mentioned, that flows and that can be measured. Investigations of a single continuum called space-time brings the nature of time into association with related questions into the nature of space, questions that have their roots in the works of early students of natural philosophy.

Among prominent philosophers, there are two distinct viewpoints on time. One view is that time is part of the fundamental structure of the universe, a dimension in which events occur in sequence. Time travel, in this view, becomes a possibility as other "times" persist like frames of a film strip, spread out across the time line. Sir Isaac Newton subscribed to this realist view, and hence it is sometimes referred to as Newtonian time.[5][6] The opposing view is that time does not refer to any kind of "container" that events and objects "move through", nor to any entity that "flows", but that it is instead part of a fundamental intellectual structure (together with space and number) within which humans sequence and compare events.

Buschy (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 8:20 AM)

We are a group that is challenging the current paradigm in physics which is Quantum Mechanics and String Theory. There is a new Theory of Everything Breakthrough. It exposes the flaws in both Quantum Theory and String Theory. Please Help us set the physics community back on the right course and prove that Einstein was right! Visit our site The Theory of Super Relativity: <a href="http://www.superrelativity.org/" title="Super Relativity">Super Relativity</a>

mmfiore (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 8:33 AM)

Maybe I am wrong but it seems to me that when we see all of the planets alligned the event will of already passed because of the distance and time it will take for the light from the distant portions of our galaxy to reach us. The Myans may of felt that the world would end then because they had never observed such an allignment before and throughout history man has felt thaat there future is influencened bu heavenly bodies.

Gary L. Roe Cisco, Tx (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 8:58 AM)

We just never know what will shake the trees and have the nuts falling to the ground do we?

Alan, I found the article very interesting and your postscript about "42" and the "X-Files" far more germaine than most of the comments above.

As always, both informative and entertaining. Keep up the good work and for most of you commentators a word of advice. Stay out of the park, it's full of squirrels. ;-)

WA Nicholson, Oklahoma City, OK (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 9:02 AM)

Belief in systems for prognosticating the future seem to be symptoms of a human tendency to want to have a tangible, physical, and controllable manifestation of the metaphysical. Regardless of what one believes (or does not believe) about the metaphysical, attempts to assert control over it by reducing it to the tangible form of a secret number code (or a system of astrology, etc.) appear likely to lead to charlatanism, on one hand, or aluminum foil hats, on the other hand.

Bob, Northern Virginia (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 9:10 AM)

Knowing is one movie not worth wasting money on that's for sure. All this numerology nonsense just stinks of religious predetermination and that everything we do is preordained and means nothing. It's sad that people actually believe that astrology garbage which is nothing but meaningless drivel from flim flam con artists.

I think like Rakesh Skarma that Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle and chaos theory rules because we can never know anything for certain, there is always doubt about future actions and reactions as it should be. Life is more fun and enriching with some mystery built in.

The Mayan prediction of 2012 being the end of the world is just as nonsenseical as every other end of world prediction that has been claimed and already proven false. Just another prediction based upon false assumptions.

Chaos Rules!

Eric, Salinas, CA (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 9:17 AM)

No. Probability dictates there is a chance for an outcome not predicted by an established mathmatical model when applied to things like choices. If that were not the case we would never arrive at a point in time where we had to make a choice as all outcomes would be predetermined. If that were the case then there would have to be an infinite number of divergent realities where the other choice was made.

While this is entirely plausible there is still a fundamental problem with predestination, that of course being it requires the presence of an observer being at the outcome before the initial choice (while simultaneously existing outside of space-time). Without that observer then there would be no way to determine which branch of a divergent universe you would be in, making it impossible to predict the future as you would be blind to the outcome of each successive choice.

Exeder (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 9:59 AM)

People are always looking for signs! Anything to help them understand their own future. People read their horoscopes and ponder about the next move.It is all a ploy by Satan to get you off the path leading to God! If everyone stopped with all this nonsense and pick up a bible instead of buying into Nostredamas or believing The Mayans doomsday prediction, or may I go further by adding about the planet Naboo sweeping by Earth and throwing us off our axis and pick up a BIBLE once in awhile. Then everyone would see that everything is going according to Gods plan! They need to claim the blood of Jesus to secure eternity! Its nothing they can earn, it is merely a gift. Only thru him will we have eternal life. He clearly says whether you believe in him or not EVERY KNEE WILL BOW BEFORE HIM! People can say its not for me, but for me and my family we choose the Lord! I beg you all to stop looking to things that cant help you, BBut turn to Jesus they will bebetter four it! Thru the Lord I Love you all!

k the painter west haven,ct (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 10:06 AM)

Maybe . . . the Mayan calendar ends in December 2012 because the author's hand got tired, or he bored with the task or maybe his wife told him to get off his ass and get something constructive done!

UnderWelmed (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 10:17 AM)

In regard to the "doomsday Maya prophecy", the Maya calendar is a cyclical calendar, nothing more. The "long count" ends in 2012 because that is the end of one cycle and the start of another. that's all it means, nothing more.
However, I do find it interesting that in a monthly newsletter which I subscribe to, which is written by a very good financial analyst whose forecasts have been right on the nose in regard to changes in the stock/financial markets and political issues, the author has said that he is regularly asked "how long do we have" by subscribers, and his response 3 years ago was "until 2011-2012, and we either solve the problems we are facing now and everyone will prosper, or we will descend into the worst disaster the world has ever seen." He's usually a very positive, upbeat sort of guy, so when he said something so black/white with no gray area, it surprised me. Basically, he says that we have a choice.
Society as we know it now may change drastically, but the planet is not going to blow up. And I believe that the Maya civilization failed for several reasons: diseases brought in by Euroepans, to which they had no resistance; gunpowder and bullets; and their own forecast that this would happen -- they were invaded and just gave up, because it was predicted, kind of like King Harold giving up at the Battle of Hastings because Halley's Comet appeared and some court astrologer told him it was a sign of doom.

Sara, Chicago, IL (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 10:24 AM)

Time Travel:

The reason you can't travel into the past is because the probability wave function has collapsed via observation. You would have to 'unobserve' the past, which you can't, to unravel or uncollapse the wave function. The uncollapsing would take infinite energy. So there is no probability of killing your own grandfather at all. Furthermore traveling into the future would require observing at all future probabilities and collapsing those probabilities until you get to the 'time' you want to arrive at. Would this be possible? Slow yourself down and let the rest of the universe do the observing.

Me_at_Work (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 10:37 AM)

Really? That's it? All that 2012 hubbub is because the Earth, Sun, and Galactic Center happen to be in a straight line? Why would that have any effect whatsoever? Remember in the 70s when the planets all lined up, everyone predicted the end of the world, huge earthquakes, etc? Nothing. I'm confident the same thing will happen here. Tell you kooks what, if you're so confident in the end of the world, send me all your money in December 2012 and I'll enjoy it in 2013. :)

Mike, Los Angeles, CA (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 11:20 AM)

You take facts and can conclude something about them. It is fun to read or watch good detective stories, like Bones, that puts seemingly useless facts together to find the guilty person. What is a fact, opinion? Inductive verse deductive argument? If a sound minded person knows those topics they can figure out stuff by just being aware.
I wonder if Physics is more of reductionism to explain the known facts. Force, friction, time, blah blah blah, are concepts (real or not, it does not matter) that one can use symbolic stuff to figure out what will happen under normal circumstances. However, it is all inductive. A scientist can plan to launch a satellite into orbit, but if the rocket hits space junk, well the prediction of the future location of the rocket using physics didn’t work.
What about stats predicting the future? Probabilistic arguments are good, but things can go very wrong. It is good to have a good bases of facts to support a probabilistic argument.
Never rule out intuition or inductive arguments. Also understand by observing the truth value of something the truth value may change. I told my friend he would probably never see a non black crow. Then I showed him an image of an albino crow to make the statement false. LOL. His conclusion was that inductive arguments were very bad… but that is dumb, inductive arguments used correctly are very powerful. A better statement is that my friend will probably never see a natural hot pink crow. This has supporting facts of how genetic information changes. How will the crow develop naturally a hot pink phenotype in its lifetime? The first one I had no facts to support my inductive argument, but this second one I did.

Science/math/reasoning stuff will help predict a likely future event, but it has to be used correctly. :-)

Sean, Weatherford, Texas (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 11:40 AM)

It isn't so much about numbers but patterns, unless you consider the numbers behind patterns. What I mean is that you can predict the future by observing patterns and then placing a numeric value to those patterns. For example. We know that by studying statistics that so many marriages will end in divorce and so many couples inside of divorce will have affairs and therefore by using the numbers we can predict that say (hypothetical) that your marrige will end in divorce and the reason cited will bre infidelity. However there are even more patterns inside that little scenario because you can glean that marriage for life is a man-made institution and has nothing to do with the natural order of patterns. I don't want to go into a drawn explanation that spans religion and society but I will say this: The numbers don't lie, knowing how to count them is the problem

One Who knows (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 11:41 AM)

@ Scott M:

In an exact solution to the equations of General Relativity, Kurt Godel proved that time does not exist as time, but as a fourth space dimention (i.e. intuitive time and the formal time of relativity are not the same thing.) In his solution, rotating "Godel Universes" contain closed timelike loops which allow for "time travel." As such, past events can be revisited. If this is so, the "past" is not really gone therefore time does not exist. I would encourage you to read "A World Without Time" for a much better explanation than I can provide here. Really interesting reading!

Jeremy R (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 12:23 PM)

How about this? We are living on a big rock, spinning through space which by coincidence is going to align with the "Center". So what? Are we the only planet that has ever aligned with the center? Has this not happened before? And if so is there no evidence of some catastrophe in the planet's past? What do you think will happen when we align? Truly? What do you think is going to happen and why?

HD, Prov, RI (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 12:32 PM)

If we can predict certain categories or subjects. Why can't those people predict the powerball to retain wealth and fortune?
Thanks
CEO of DealPlayground

Seyla, Providence RI (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 12:39 PM)

2012! I was planning on taking the kids to Disney in 2013. Better move it up a notch!

Rob, NY (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 12:40 PM)

I am interested to know in which year will there be available for a computer prediction of numbers that can accurately generate a set of predictable winning numbers of the lottery like, Lotto.

This means one can win a top prize in a particular draw if one can predict a set of winnning numbers for it.

This will save us the headache of thinking up a set of winning numners. It will also save us the headache of losing much money on losing the lotto draws.

Daniel white (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 12:47 PM)

Regarding the Myan prophesy of 2012, please be aware theirs isn't the only ancient calendar ending on Dec. 21st, 2012. That date is very significant and we would be fools not have some apprehension about the fast approaching day....we have no written records prior to the Sumerian culture (around 5000 BC) so we really have no idea what to expect, but you can count on something happening due to the alignment. The earth is a very fickle hunk of rock, and the slightest change in gravitational pull from an astronomical alignment could have catastrophic impact. Could the magnetic poles shift? Yes, it’s
happened before and could happen again. Could a slight change in the gravitational field of the earth of the sun be bad, yes, if it changes the course of a near earth orbit asteroid, and causes it to hit us, instead of coming close – the asteroid Apophis is a very good and very real example.

I’m no harbinger of doom and certainly hope the end of time as we know it isn’t a few short years away, but the universe is not only stranger than we know – it’s stranger than we can imagine......

Regarding numbers telling the future, lets stop a moment and think about what numbers really predict – and contrary to what most folks think, 2 + 2 does not equal 4. Numbers represent a set of probability’s; for example, 2 + 2 probably equals 4 but there is no absolute...why you ask....because God gave us the marvelous gift of free will. Einstein understood this as do most modern physicists. This is proven by Jesus telling his disciples that no one knows the end of time, not even Jesus Himself, and this is due to the free will of man. By repenting of sin, and turning back to God, as individuals and as a nation, we can postpone the end of time....but by ignoring God, taking Him out of our government, schools, and lives, and by promoting sin as we do so well today (very much
like Sodom and Gomorrah) we are tempting and angering God, thus accelerating the coming end. He will tolerate our disobedience only for so long....and we’re pushing it like never before by electing a president whom is pro-homosexual, supports abortion, and is trying to give a portion of Israel’s land to the Arabs which would break a covenant between God and Abraham. This can be proven in a different way, if you don’t believe
in God.....the stock market is a great example...and contrary to what a lot of financial analysts will tell you, the Dow doesn’t fluctuate on any other factor than anticipation. What a company does or does not do, is not really a factor at all. It’s what people think the company will do.....so again, free will (the opinion of stockholders)overrides any mathematical model out there. Ford Motor Co. may build and sell a million cars this year (yes, this is an exaggeration) and make a billion dollars in profit, but if stockholders anticipate FMC will only sell a hundred cars this year and incur a billion dollars in debt and sell their positions to prevent loss, the stock price will tank no matter what an analyst and model tell us.....and no matter what FMC really does.

If there was no free will and we could analyze (measure) the state of every atom at one very precise point in time, ie. it’s current motion, and we had a computer powerful enough, in theory, we could predict the future....but alas, even measuring the state of an atom changes that state, so no, we can’t predict the future...at least not yet. And then, there’s free will......but that’s another conversation.

But Hollywood doesn’t run on fact, it’s all about fiction, so enjoy the movies....

Patrick Sheridan (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 12:49 PM)

"Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards."
-Soren Kierkegaard

Leprakawn, Fort Worth, Texas (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 1:35 PM)

I've always liked the number 4,365,178.. With the right equation, anything can be predicted. But whats up with Nicolas Cage? He's made 3 lame movies now. American Treasure, American Treasure II and now knowing. Someone needs to help him get better gigs..

Clarence, Olivehurst California (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 1:35 PM)

Numbers have played a role since the beginning of human existence. When were we born? On what day, of what month of what year at what time of the day or night? How much did we weigh? How long were we? How many chromosomes do we have? How much horse power does our car have, how far is it from point a to point b? What's your address? Boy are you fat or what? How much do you weigh anyway? How old are you? How big is your house? How well endowed are you? What are your measurements? How much money do you earn in a week? In a month in a year? When is your vacation? How long is your vacation? Face it, without numbers guiding every aspect of our lives we could not exist. So can one with an understanding of how numbers work truly predict the future? Or simply survive a Friday the 13th simply by staying indoors for 24 hours or see Satan in the numbers 666? Who knows? These are all questions and questions can be of course innumerous!

Desi, Los Angeles, Ca (Sent Friday, March 20, 2009 2:06 PM)

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