Remember the Mayan Calendar and the doomsday of December 21, 2012? I wrote about one of the worst predictions I personally experienced, but 2012 took over the world. Like so many things that crossed cultures, the real story was far less doomsday and far more cultural ignorance, at best. Most of the images of the circled stone were actually from the Aztec, not the Maya, who didn't really traffic in apocalypses. In reality, the Maya used two calendars: one with 365 days and one with 260 days. Every day had two names and reset every fifty-two years. In addition, they had a long count of years like the Roman calendar we use today. 2012 was a reset year for their two differing calendars. That's it. IN 5000 AD, WHAT WILL THEY THINK? Imagine a civilization in 5000 AD digging up one of our paper calendars with cute cats or hot firefighters on it, seeing December 31st, calculating what day it would be for them, and panicking because December 31st was in two of their months! … [Read more...] about It’s Been 10 Years Since the End of the World
Interesting History
How to Learn to Love the Wicked World
DON'T SOLVE PROBLEMS; GET NEW AND BETTER IDEAS I talk a lot in this newsletter about how to dismantle your assumptions and beliefs and question the water that you swim in. But equally important, if not more important, is the ability to get new and better ideas once you've done that. One of humanity's main tools for seeing things differently is the scientific method. Don't click away! I know, boring, Middle School level science, but we have a massive problem. We were never really taught the first step! WHAT WE DID LEARN IN SCHOOL? How many tests and experiments did you run in school? How many times did you have to come up with the question, not just the answer? I remember an upper division writing class in college. I got a C on my first paper. Somewhat gobsmacked, I went to the Professor who informed me that I had come to a different conclusion, not the one he gave me. I said, "Let me get this straight, you gave me the hypothesis, the evidence, and the conclusion … [Read more...] about How to Learn to Love the Wicked World