Could the Earth have two suns by 2012?
 

Found this:

In the Star Wars saga, George Lucas imagined a world where twin suns rose and fell in the horizon. Looks like his vision may not be so far-fetched.

Astrophysicists say that Betelgeuse, the red super-giant that is the second biggest star in the universe, is losing mass?an indication of gravitational collapse. Brad Carter, a senior lecturer of physics at the University of Southern Queensland, explained to news.com.au that the star is essentially running out of the fuel at its core. ?This fuel keeps Betelgeuse shining and supported. When this fuel runs out the star will literally collapse in upon itself and it will do so very quickly,? he said. The subsequent explosion will appear tens of millions of times brighter than the sun, meaning 24-hours of light on Earth.

(More on Time.com: Voyager 1 Nears Edge of Solar System.)

?It goes bang, it explodes, it lights up," Carter said. "We'll have incredible brightness for a brief period of time for a couple of weeks and then over the coming months it begins to fade and then eventually it will be very hard to see at all.?

And while the celestial event could take place before the end of 2012, it may not occur for a million years.

As you'd expect, plenty of folks interpret the impending supernova as a sign of the Apocalypse. (Coincidentally, the Mayan calendar predicts Armageddon in 2012, and the word "Betelgeuse" has strong associations with the devil.) But Carter dismisses the doomsayers, pointing out that the implosion will shower the earth with tiny particles called neutrinos that are the building blocks of our planet's most essential elements. ?It literally makes things like gold, silver?all the heavy elements?even things like uranium?.a star like Betelgeuse is instantly forming for us all sorts of heavy elements and atoms that our own Earth and our own bodies have from long past supernovi." (via the Huffington Post)

(More on Time.Com: Spanish Woman Declares Ownership of the Sun.)
http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/01/21/.../?iid=moreonnf

Pretty cool stuff if you ask me. I hope I get to witness this for my self.

damn all this with 2012 and Mayas....

Bump for tits and pumpkin pie

Both things are on my top 10 list.

I just found an article trying to refute the above:

http://news.discovery.com/space/dont...e-in-2012.html

I'm moving to Ganimedes...

Hell I'll take being showered by little particles of gold ;)

Stupid, if the world ends I will run around naked with bunny ears on.

They were sooo intelligent, they couldn't predict, or save, the extinction of their own culture.
:2 cents:

It's a weird enough concept to know that we're looking backwards in time a the light that left the explosion x amount of time ago. So if it "happens" here in 2012, it happened long ago.. right? lol

Nice and vague.

Neutrinos do not create heavy elements, this guy doesn't have his facts straight...

True, I think he is referring to a theory that neutrinos can react via fission with nuclei
thus changing a nucleus into a heavier one. But it's only a theory. Now that I re-read the article, its more sensational than anything else.

But it sure would be cool to see in our life time.

Time will tell...

i hope the earth has a daughter next !!!!

I really laugh to predictions and all this doom idiocy, but get your facts straight: they predicted it but they didn't do anything because it was a cycle for them. By the way, last time I checked Mayans were alive and have their own culture, language, music and so on, with the difference that their religion is a mix of catholic with pagan .

btw, the number 2012 is because it's the end of one of those cycles, they believe in cycles of life and death and 2012 would be the end of a death cycle

and finally, Mayan culture didn't "end" with Spaniards, but it started declining in IX century and by the time of Aztecs they were a bunch of scattered villages in the jungle.... just like today

"And while the celestial event could take place before the end of 2012, it may not occur for a million years."

Dead on guess work at it's best - sounds like the lawyers got at them

tits and ice cream :thumbsup

:2 cents::2 cents::2 cents:

chances are nothing happens...by 2012...or a million years...something tells me it will happen in say 300,000 years..lol

man the solar energy peeps must be drooling

For this to affect us, it would have had to of happened over 500 years ago.

uh oh... the Mayans may have been right after all.

Thank Goodness I didn't have to type it....This answer will suffice.

:thumbsup:thumbsup:thumbsup

Heh, will be interesting to see if this becomes a major story - I happen to have Betelgeuse.com. :P

I love the whole "it may happen in 2012 or it may not happen for another million years" thing. BE SCARED...or not.

that would be a hell of a site to see

I do that every day, can't figure how is it related to the end of the world :helpme

Glen: Hey Dave! I have an awesome idea for Pimp Roll, it could really make us a lot of money and I think we should drop what we are doing and get going on this asap...

Dave: How long would it take to implement this idea and how much will it cost?

Glen: Could be by the end of this month or it could be by the year 2035... it could cost us a few thousand or 100 million really...

Dave: ........*closes office door on Glen*

Glen: :.... yeah, I probably should do more research first.....

Hey...At least if his prediction is wrong, he won't be around to get lynched!

btw, the fun fact is that if this happens next year, we'll find out in.... year 2652! :1orglaugh

guess I won't lose any sleep on this :winkwink:

oh and for the record betelegeuse is the second biggest star that we can see, not the universe, the answer to that is impossible to know at this point or ever most likely.

some great astrophysicists we done dug up in 'ere ;)

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

GAWD... come on... are you sure this guy knows what he's talking about? I'm not a scientist (just a science enthusast) and even I know he's full of shit.

A dying star becomes a Super Nova but only if it has enough mass. And even if it does, it's over 160 Parsecs or 520 Light Years away (approximately) which means it won't even be bright enough to shed any visible light on the Earth.

It might go supernova in 2012, or anytime in the next Ten Million Years (yes, 10 Million Years). 10m years is "short" in cosmic time.

Neutrinos are NOT the building blocks of gold and other elements (WTF?). Neutrinos are massless particles, that travel near the speed of light, have no charge, and are so small they can pass through miles of lead without touching any other atom or particle. Nutrinos come from all directions in space and pass through the earth and sometimes our bodies all the time.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl...2786/img/1.jpg

:thumbsup

Actually the Mayans were great astronomers sand their astronomical works are extremely accurate. Amazing feat considering what they had to work with. The Mayan calendar never did predict the earth would in in 2012. Their calendar ends in 2012. Now the date their calender ends is also the our sun aligns with the galactic core which happens once every 26,000 years.

yeah the people that chopped people's heads off were right! :uhoh :1orglaugh

well, they were a special kind and very different in that "chopping head" aspect to all other cultures through history














































































































wait.... :helpme

One word: bullshit. Hmmm maybe those were 2 words, who knows :P

That is where the money is at right now, I just need to figure out how to get in.

Fusion is what produces heavy elements. Normally it stops at Iron because beyond that there's no energy output, so it takes a collapse and explosion to fuse heavier elements such as gold or uranium. Neutrinos are a byproduct of fusion and are constantly being produced in the hearts of all stars. An exploding supernova will obviously send out a lot more.

When it blows, Betelgeuse will give enough light to read by at night, but it won't be dangerous. Could happen any time in the next million years so I won't be holding my breath.

So if some dumb ass who needs $20 blows your head off at the ATM to steal it
from you them that means you were not intelligent enough to save yourself from
extinction right?

OK.

:1orglaugh

no bullshit at all. It's a fact that Betelgeuse will implode next year.... or in 1 million years.

btw, I have breaking news: the Sun will implode and Earth will disappear... could happen in any period within the next 30 million years, so start buying water and canned food!

But maybe all the extra sunlight burns us into crispy critters?


:Oh crap

http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/2474/images1my.jpg

The article says it could happen by 2012....but oh, it might be another million years. Don't you just love science?

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh :1orglaugh

If nothing catastrophic happens in 2012, can we please get a promise from all the "end of time" nutcases to STFU about their future cockamamie theories?

GFY expert strikes again.

Not Likely ...

or i million yrs, what a prediction