I thought the world was supposed to end 12-31-1999 (which by the way was NOT the end of the century). This is just another Chicken Little story. The sky is falling, the sky is falling.
The following taken loosely from Wikipedia:
Some people claim that an alignment will occur when the sun rises above the horizon December 12 2012, at which point the sun will rise in the middle of the Milky Way Galaxy, thus causing an alignment between the earth, sun, and the galactic center. This event is said to cause numerous earth changes, however that is not possible considering that the event is only a visual phenomenon from the earths perspective, which is caused by the precession of the equinoxes or the 26,000 year wobble of the earth, which only changes our perspective, not the actual position of the earth in relation to the galaxy. In short, there is no gravitational force or radiation to be expected from this event because other than the tilt of the earth, nothing will be any different than any other solstice.
There are also claims that an actual physical alignment of our entire solar system will occur with the horizontal plane of the Milky Way Galaxy on that day. The solar system is moving around the center of the galaxy every 225 million years or so, and while doing so is moving up and down in a cycle crossing the plane every 33 million years. According to the Journal Nature, this isn't so because there is evidence of the solar system crossing the galactic plane 3 million years ago. This would mean that we are moving away from the galactic plane not toward it, and we won’t be due to cross it for another 30 million years.
Among other possible scenarios is that a shift of the earth's magnetic poles may occur, and that this will leave the earth vulnerable to harmful radiation from the sun. According to NASA this event does not occur on a particular day or year, but over the course of thousands of years, and contrary to popular belief the magnetic field does not vanish during this natural cycle, it just becomes more complex as it makes the transition.
Some proponents of the pole shift scenario claim that this shift would be a physical movement of the poles of the earth, and not simply a magnetic shift of the poles. This event is called a true polar wanderer, and we have a had a few degree shift in the past, but no where near a reversal, there is no reason to suggest this is likely or even possible. According to William Sager, a Texas A&M Oceanographer, a slight shift in the physical pole occurs at a rate between 5 and 10 degrees per million years, which means that this event could not happen on a particular day or year but only over a long period of time.
