NASA Calls '2012' Most Flawed Sci-Fi Film Ever

The 2009 film "2012" depicted an ultimate end-of-the-world scenario based on an ancient Mayan calendar that ends on Dec. 21, 2012. But does NASA believe the film accurately portrays something that will really happen? Absolutely not.

In fact, NASA scientists say the doomsday "2012" is the most ridiculous sci-fi film ever.

"The filmmakers took advantage of public worries about the so-called end of the world as apparently predicted by the Mayans of Central America," Donald Yeomans told The Australian.

Sony Pictures/Everett Collection

 

Doomsday befalls Earth in the 2009 film "2012," but NASA says none of the events in the movie could really happen.

Yeomans, a senior research scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., heads NASA's Near-Earth Asteroid Rendezvous mission, which keeps an eye out for any celestial objects that might come close to Earth.

"The agency is getting so many questions from people terrified that the world is going to end in 2012 that we have had to put up a special website to challenge the myths," Yeomans said. "We have never had to do this before."

One of Yeomans' complaints with the "2012" movie was how the global apocalypse was triggered by neutrino particles that come to Earth on solar flares and end up causing staggering problems to our planet.

According to NASA, neutrinos are completely neutral and can't interact with anything physical.

"The Earth's magnetic field, which deflects charged particles from the sun, does reverse polarity on time scales of about 400,000 years, but there is no evidence that a reversal, which takes thousands of years to occur, will begin in 2012," Yeomans wrote on his JPL blog.

It would be easy to simply remind the public and NASA that it was just a movie and shouldn't be taken as seriously as many people have.

"Now, I for one, love a good book or movie as much as the next guy. But the stuff flying around through cyberspace, TV and the movies is not based on science," Yeomans blogged.

Other doomsday movies that NASA has criticized include "Armageddon," "The Day After Tomorrow" and "The Core" (a film Yeomans was approached to be a consultant on).

On the other side of the sci-fi coin, NASA commended films that were more scientifically on target, like "Blade Runner," "Gattaca" and "Jurassic Park."

Yeomans is adamant that 2012 doomsday predictions are all false.

"For any claims of disaster or dramatic changes in 2012, the burden of proof is on the people making these claims. Where is the science? Where is the evidence?

"There is none, and all the passionate, persistent and profitable assertions, whether they are made in books, movies, documentaries or over the Internet, cannot change that simple fact."