The End Is Near (Sort Of)

Today is Pretend To Be A Time Traveler Day, so let us recap some of the greatest doomsday prophesies that never happened.

The 2011 Rapture

This prophecy was made by the famous end-of-the-world prophet and American Christian radio host Harold Camping. Using the power of biblical numerology, he predicted that The Rapture (Judgement Day) would take place on May 21st, 2011, with the end of times occurring on October 21st, 2011. This was not the first time he got the rapture date wrong. He has made the same prediction 12 times already, and writing a book about one titled 1994.

The Mayan Apocalypse

It was set to take place on December 21, 2012. Many people believed this was the apocalypse because the Mayan calendar ended on this day. A calendar that has continuously tracked time for 5,125 years just stopped on this day with no warning. This sudden ending led to many end-of-day predictions. At the time, this was such a popular theory that it spawned many movies, like 2012. Turns out the whole thing was just a misinterpretation. What actually ended was the first “Great Cycle” of mankind.

Y2K

Often referred to as the Millennium Bug, this theory was set to occur on January 1st, 2000. It would hit all the computers in the world, making them stop working. The reason is that it would read the year as 00, making them confused and crash. Back in the late 90s, computers were just beginning to become a part of everyday life, so our knowledge of such machines was limited. The only known problem that occurred was with the ATMS in the UK shortly after midnight. It lasted 45 minutes.

True Way

Hong-Ming Chen established a Taiwanese religion called Chan Tao, or True Way, in 1993. True Way was a religious movement that blended Christianity, Buddhism, UFO conspiracy theories, and Taiwanese folk religion. When Chen’s religion was set up in Garland, Texas in 1997, he predicted that God would appear on Channel 18 looking like him on March 25, 1998. Shortly after, millions of demonic entities will roam the Earth, causing mass extinction and flooding.

Halley’s Comet

Halley’s Comet is a very famous astronomical event that occurs every 75 years. Unfortunately, the people in 1910 were not very knowledgeable about such reoccurring space events like this. Because of how close it will be passing Earth, many people feared the comet was going to crash into Earth, ending all life as we know it. Another popular theory was its tail was going to release poisonous gases into the air, killing all of us. As panic grew, newspapers published stories of the impending doom that never happened.

The Second Ice Age

In the 1970s, the world was experiencing a global cooling. In 1971, a climate researcher by the name of Stephen Schneider noticed something terrible was coming. He predicted that the cooling effect on dirty air would outweigh the warming effect of carbon dioxide leading Earth into a second Ice Age. Scientists believed this theory almost immediately as they discovered we had been in our Interglacial, or Holocene, period for too long. The theory is still pitched today and is called Climate Change.

The Hen Of Leeds

This theory dates back to 1806 in the small English town of Leeds. A domesticated hen had laid eggs with “Christ is coming!” inscribed on them. It became a regular occurrence on this farm, attracting media attention and other people who wanted to see these magical eggs. People saw it as a sign of Christ's Second Coming. Soon after the story broke around the world, it was proven to be a hoax. The farmer was writing the messages on eggs she collected before the people would show up, wrote the messages with corrosive ink, and put them back inside the poor hen.