sing Universe simulation software is easier than calculating planet positions on paper. In looking in to information about 2012, both mystics and skeptics say that JUNE will be exciting! Venus will transit the Sun. Sure enough, in checking Celestia’s calibration for 21DEC12, Venus is basically between Earth and the Sun. The actual transit will be 05JUNE12 (pictured).

Helio lovers or Sun Scientists or heliologists (I don’t know what they’re called) agree that we’re in the twenty-third cycle of our Sun and don’t know when the Twenty-fourth is coming or what will mark the change. The science of the Sun is confusing. There are maximums and minimums and acceptable mini-ice ages that have occurred as recently as two-hundred years ago. No photographers were able to document the peculiar freeze over of common rivers and fields, but painters captured the events like The Skating Preacher here.

This whimsical time when flowing rivers where stilled unexpectedly didn’t seem to alarm anyone. Imagine the frenzy FOX News and CNN would both have if this were to happen today! But after looking in the dirt for carbon particles and examining all sorts of interesting muck and records stored in ice and trees and geological samples, scientists found records going back 20,000 years. The 2012 alarmists mark the Sun’s cycle at about 11,000 years. An interesting observation here:

About 11,000 years ago, Earth’s temperature came up for air. It’s not beyond the capacity of humans to exist in harsh climates. An overall difference of 10 degrees centigrade isn’t something that would snuff you out directly or immediately, but you’d notice the change. What you would notice more were the changes around you. Water, ice, landslides, flash floods, coasts where none were before and rivers innundated with new water that broke their banks and changed course would certainly prompt you to notice a, “massive” change.

With the 11,000 year cycle of the Sun a distinct, though debated, possibility and the good fortune to have Venus act as an early warning system in 2012, here’s something else. Modern scientists, while well versed and extremely scientific when discussing the Sun, have recently decided that our heaviest planets strongly influence the Sun’s behavior. Those minimums and maximums affect most everything on Earth pretty heavily. On 21DEC12, Celestia forecasts the heaviest planet in the Solar System to be sitting behind us. That’s a bad thing.

The good news is that Mercury, Venus and Mars will be on the other side of the Sun. Kind of. Their combined effect on the Sun might be strong enough to pull smaller storms away from Earth.

In ancient times, their scientists recorded a snake of fire in the sky. Today we know that Venus is a planet with enough gas on the surface to form a tail in the daytime sky if the Sun has a strong enough storm. With Venus between the Earth and the Sun, a massive Sun storm would probably make it look like a little fiery snake were in the sky indeed. That would indicate greater trouble. Should the Sun toss a storm to Earth that’s dangerous but not entirely leathal, “stars” will appear in the daytime sky surrounding the Sun. They’re not stars. They’re highly charged bits of Earth’s magnetic field crackling and lighting up more like sparks. You would see the ones that are coming your way, so naturally, they’ll appear to surround the Sun since everything is line-of-sight.

If you do see stars in the daytime sky, don’t bother trying to call anyone. Your cell phone will already be dead. But at least the oceans aren’t coming to wipe you away!

DINARIUS Bryan's old Digital Interest blog