2012hoax

Wow, six years old.

And nothing but a hypothesis, to boot, how scintillating.

March 2005? I wonder if anyone has done any more recent studies? Why yes, yes they have, and continue to do so across many fields.

Long story short is that 62 million years is an average (and disputed one at that) for when species diversity fluctuates - you'd be more accurate with extinction events on timescales half as long as that. And then you throw a spanner in the works and find that if you investigate marine life with the lengthy history those species have had, and it doesn't agree with either 30 million or 62 million year events, so you're back to square one with nothing but a perceived cycle that may or may not be there.

As for Nibiru, and other associated objects that don't exist, you find yourself with one paper coming out and saying that it's all feasible, and then the next paper comes along and concludes that, actually, it isn't feasible. It's like a tug of war, and there is currently more mounting evidence for the likes of such an object to not cause periodic events that lead to extinction.

So what else can be said? Welcome to Earth?

You can't debunk this, because scientists say so!

I don't think you understand science. It is not because a scientist says so that it must be true.
It is the job of other scientists to also test their claims and even tear it down when it is wrong.

Bad news - we are way past our 'extinct by' date

So? What makes you think it will happen in your lifetime?
Or any lifetime in the next 100 generations after you.

Kindly tell that to the scientists because they have the evidence, not me!

As for you with the foulest mouth on 2012hoax, I wouldn't bother so much if you were to jump into a sinkhole and bury yourself.

Hi Ben;

This is a good moment to digress, and explain something about science.

Rule #1: Everything in science is provisional. This means that we don't assume that because we think something is true today, that it will always be thought to be true. When better evidence comes along, then the scientists debate causes, and develop alternate theories, and hash it out until there's an idea that rises to the top. Example: We used to think that Newton's equations of motion held true in all cases. Then Einstein came along and showed everybody that relativity's equations better describe the universe. Einsteins theories explain everything that Newtons did, and more. Einsteins theory wins. (this is somewhat of a bad example because Einstein's equations are typically not used unless you are calculating things moving near the speed of light… Newton's equations are simpler for things like sending spacecraft to other planets, etc).

Rule #2: Evidence is the King. Data, data and more data. It doesn't matter if you have an idea that explains life, the universe and everything as a single 2 digit number (42!), if it doesn't match reality, then its wrong. Theories rise or fall based on how well they are supported by data.

Rule #3: Peer Review is the Queen. When a scientist formulates a theory, they try to publish it in a peer-reviewed journal. This is where a group of peers (people who work in the same field as the publishing scientist) look at the theory, and make sure that the data supports the conclusion, that there aren't some unstated assumptions made, that the idea is worth publishing. Once published the theory is then read by other scientists who react to it. They may support it, they may provide data that refutes it. So, just because something is published in a peer-reviewed journal, doesn't make it true either. The theory has to weather the reaction from the scientific community.

Back to your question: The idea that a mass extinction occurs every 62 million years does not appear to enjoy a lot of support in the scientific community. So, right now the answer is "probably not".

What good is worrying about a problem that doesn't exist?

It also used to be theorized that the Earth was flat.

Sure, in the same way it's possible for DNA to spontaneously mutate and allow you to teleport anywhere at will - i.e., pretty damn unlikely.

In fact, it'd be more likely that your children, your childrens children, your grandchildrens grandchildrens grandchildren and so on and so on down the part of your family tree that simply doesn't exist yet will live complete lives and still not have to wonder about extinction.

Don't. Worry. About it.

No.

The paper is actually not about mass extinctions, but rather in a periodic loss of marine life biodiversity. The authors themselves say that the cycles do not appear to match up with any mass extinctions. Instead they present the data, and then speculate about various potential causes, winding up with the obvious statement that more research needs to be done.

edit: The difference between a mass extinction and a loss of biodiversity needs to be explained, I think, because it is a subtle but important distinction.

Evolution regularly cranks out new species. This compensates for the loss of various species as they go extinct. If something changed in the marine habitat that slowed the rate of new species, but the die-off of existing species kept on at the same rate, then your 'bucket' of species begins to empty. That is a loss of biodiversity. A mass extinction would be the die-off of large numbers of species in a "short" period of time, where "short" means on the order of tens of millions of years.

The paper is here:

http://muller.lbl.gov/papers/Rohde-Muller-Nature.pdf

Reading through it, the authors appear to say "Hey, there might be something interesting going on with this, and we should look into it a bit more". It is not the foregone conclusion as was reported in the original link.

edit: Mary: See the post above. The paper addresses periodic loss of biodiversity in marine habitats. Not 'extinctions'. So the original news article got it wrong.

Congrats Norman, you've managed to do what I know you've been trying to since the day you got here. You've managed to work people into a panic, well done, feeling good about ourselves are we?

Mary;
I know you weren't addressing me, but I'll try and put this into a little perspective for you. If this theory were even remotely close to being true, the odds of it happening in your lifetime are so slim they're not even worth thinking about. Norman, who was the O.P, is in my opinion, playing a little game here. He likes to run off and find things to attempt to prove everyone here wrong, then when he finds something he considers credible, he pats himself on the back and declares victory. Trouble with that is, he uses lens flare videos and talks about a non existent planet to prove his nonsense. Don't let this type of thing worry you, like I said the chances of this theory being right and some extinction level event happening while you are on this planet are so low your wasting your time even thinking about it.

Is there something to prove it isn't going to happen?

That is an incorrect way to think about it. You're requiring proof of the negative. What is first required is proof of the positive, that something IS going to happen. And as noted by Astro, the paper makes no such claim.

Do you know how long even one million years is?

The oldest person to have ever lived was 122 years old when she died. That one life could have been lived over 8000 times before reaching a million years. If we use an average life expectancy of only 80 years, we could still live it 12,500 times before reaching 1 million years. That's how short our lives our compared to how looooooong even just one million years is, let alone 3 million, 30 million, 60 million.

Worrying about mass extinction is like worrying about falling out of a spaceship and landing on the surface of the Sun, it's just not going to happen to you, and even if you were an astronaut and even if we as a species were able to safely get close to the sun in spaceships, you still wouldn't be likely to fall out of it and fall into the Sun.

Edit: And all of that is ignoring that extinction events don't happen like clockwork, the whole idea is disputed as a few of us have mentioned above.

Oh i almost forgot!

Did you know that while the dinosaurs where wiped out, other species who lived at the same time as the dinosaurs suvived?

Hurray, that means it wasnt an mass extinction at all \o/

There is only one flaw.
There is nothing out there that is that big to wipe out in the next 10 years.