I have been asked many times whether there is any scientific basis for a significant 2012 event. A claim that there is no scientific corroboration is a mantra of 2012 deniers. However, there is evidence from geology and other physical sciences that provide a basis for a Maya belief in a 2012 cataclysm.
When I’m asked as to whether there is scientific evidence to support a 2012 cataclysmic event, I start with the history of global size disasters that the Maya would have knowledge of from legends and campfire stories, just as knowledge of the Trojan wars, Biblical events and so much other history was passed down as campfire discussions long before they were recorded in writing.
Going back to the fact that the Maya believed that their world was destroyed four times in the past and the 2012 date foreshadows what they believed is fifth and last destruction, is there any scientific evidence of four major globe shaking disasters the Maya could have had knowledge of through campfire history? The answer is yes and we can start with the most famous Biblical disaster—the Flood.
Ancestors of the Maya and other indigenous people of the Americas originated in Asia and came to the Americas by crossing the Bering Land Bridge.
The so-called “bridge” was a dry land mass about a thousand miles wide which connected what is now called Russia’s Siberia region with Alaska. It was the path that prehistoric peoples and animals used to migrate from Asia and populate the American continent. That the path opened and closed many times over the eons is found in the presence not only of humans, but of species of animals that are found in both Asia and the Americas.
The final closure was caused by rising seas and turned the land bridge into the shallow sea it is today.
The Bering Land Bridge was deluged because of a phenomena that is in the news now everyday—global warming. Higher temperature thousands of years ago caused that land bridge and many others around the world to disappear under the seas as the planet turned up the heat and glacial ice that covered at times almost a third of the planet melted.
It is evident that the Flood referred to in Maya legend as one of the four earth shattering disasters was the disappearance of the land bridge under water. We also have to keep in mind that the area wasn’t actually a “bridge” that connected the people of Asia and America but a land mass people lived on.
With this in mind, we started with question of whether there is scientific evidence of cataclysmic events the Maya would be aware of that could form their legend that their world has suffered destruction four times. The first is Flood. We will deal with the other three in the next blog before going on to discuss the one of most concern to us: the fifth one.