2012 ... hype or possibility? NOT A DOOMSDAY RANT!

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I realize this may seem simplistic and all but why does the oil simply just not go sideways or down instead of building pressure.

This is probably inadequate, but I will try.

There is a thick layer of Luann salt that overlies most of the Gulf drilling area. This salt is totally non-porous and does not allow anything to travel upward through it.

The oil does try to travel sideways but will get trapped against non-porous sedimentary layers that have been faulted up or down, for example, or a salt dome. This forms a trap. Sometimes the porous layer just ends because of a change in the geology caused by the paleoenvironment.

I don't think it can travel downwards because hydrcarbons are lighter than the sediments. So as the sediments are compressed by inconceivable pressure formed by the sediment load above, a totally aporous salt layer which doesn't allow any hydrocarbons through, and the heat and pressure from below, you have incredible pressure built up in the hydrocarbons which don't have anywhere to go because they are trapped. The Gulf is a fairly unique place to drill because of the Luann salt layer and the pressure. It is, in fact, one of the most dangrous places on this planet to drill because of that pressure.

Google oil geology or subsurface geology of the Gulf of Mexico or something. Lots of info out there that is better than what you can get on a chicken board.

Sorry for the hijack, Lovin.
 
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Good job of explaining it BrindleB. I was trying to give a very generalized description but thanks for the specific info about the gulf.

Back to the original topic. Hey, how about those Mayans? We can thank the Mayans and Aztecs for bringing us chocolate. To many our world would have not been worth living in without it so perhaps its just a good trade off
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When we were down in Mexico the Mayan decendents would make a point every time that they were not Aztecs. That the Aztecs has lots of nasty habits, like the flaying you mentioned, but the Mayans did not and were much more peacable civilized folks. Truth?
 
Nope, very incorrect. The Mayans were just as bloody and obsessed with the sacrifice of people as the Aztecs were. Did they do it as much, probably not. The Aztecs were an efficient killing machine when it came to human sacrifice.
Watch the movie Apocalypto, its based on Mayan sacrifice, not Aztec. The main sacrifice scene they are putting to death prisoners to please the sun god Kul Kul Kan. The Aztecs main god was Huitzilipochtli, the sun god. They believed they had to sacrifice each morning to get the sun to rise in the sky. Yes the film is fiction, but based upon known knowledge that we have of Mayans now. You can go to the great pyramids of the Mayans and see they have sacrificial chambers just as the Aztecs did. That area of Mexico now depends upon tourism and they dont want to admit that their ancestors were just as bloodthirsty as the Aztecs. They still want everyone to believe that 60's hippie belief that the Mayans were just simple farmers in touch with the land and the universe, blah blah blah....
They fought and had wars against each other to see which city state would be the most powerful and whoever won would sacrifice their enemies.

One show that I have seen that covers the topic really well is a history channel show called Engineering an Empire. They do an hour long show about the Mayans and it explains their accomplishments and their brutality, in a fact based way. You might be able to find it on youtube if you wanted to watch.
 
As I understand it, the Mayan calender predicts profound change, not the end of the world. If that's indeed what happens, it could be good, or it could be bad. I'm hoping for good.

The End of the World As We Know It.......the key phrase being As We Know It. Again, that could go either way.

I have a fervent hope that people are waking up to the idea that we need to change the way we do a lot of things, and that this planet's ability to absorb damage and pollution is limited.

When 2012 gets here, in just a short time, relatively speaking, I guess we'll all find out then. Meanwhile, it's kind of fun to speculate about, but I wouldn't waste any time being worried or frightened about it.

"The end of civilization as we know it" is one of my favorite topics, and I'm a huge fan of speculative fiction based on that type of scenario. The result of such a thing would no doubt be a period of chaos and destruction, but maybe a better world when all the smoke clears away. Or maybe not. That's another great unknowable, until it actually happens, IMO.
 
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Mayans also did weird things in later days like bind babies' heads to planks to flatten them out and wear headbands with beads on them that dangled in the eyes so that children grew up cross-eyed.

Most Mesoarmerican cultures practiced human sacrifice in some form

The Olmecs are the oldest North American civilization and came up with the calendar idea, the Mayans just made it more accurate

Again, according to their calendar the world has already ended 4 times before and we're still here. We managed to survive the "Flood" when the glaciers melted at the end of the Ice Age, we can survive the next one. Although I do think it's interesting that they predict the world to end by earthquales when so many large cities are built on fault lines
 

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