The bottom line

It's the end of the world as we know it.

-- R.E.M., 1987

Or not.

For a while now, armchair eschatologists have had the date Dec. 21, 2012, circled in their datebooks. That's supposedly the last day on the ancient Mayan calendar. Since their calendar appears to extend no further, some interpret 2012 as the end of the world.

If that's news to you, you're not alone, Apparently, it's also news to the Mayans.

"I came back from England last year and, man, they had me fed up with this stuff," said Apolinario Chile Pixtun of Guatemala, the current tribal chief of the Mayan Indians.

Mexican archaeologist and Mayan expert Guillermo Bernal suggests that the concept of apocalypse never originated with the Maya, but rather was projected retroactively upon its history by Western, Christian thought.

All we know is that over the past several hundred years, doomsayers have a perfect record of failing to predict the end of the world. So we side with precedent, and predict that the world will continue to exist past Dec. 21, 2012.

And if we're wrong? We promise to dutifully publish a correction.