What are the signs of the end of the world? Or even still, the end of time?

When you start to think about it you realize that the end of the world and the end of time are two different things in a sense. The end of time is more of a universal thing (the actual universe), whereas the end of the world is just that, our world. Religions, philosophers, shamans, prophets, and even "nut cases" (you know, those on the street corners with the signs as we so often think of t hem) all have their own ideas and times as when the world will end. And the thing is, they don't entirely all agree on how or when. But pretty much they all would agree that sometime, eventually, the world will end and probably the universe too.

So how will the world end? Will the end of the world come at the finger of a man controlling the nuke button? Will the end of the world come with a natural space-born disaster such as an asteroid? Perhaps the world will end when our sun expand? Maybe the world will end when a deity will return to earth? When it happens, it won't really matter -- that'll be it. But what does matter is how people prepare for it. And what's not too surprising is the preparations are the same no matter what you believe. Even if you believe that God will return, there's no reason not to prepare for an asteroid impact! It's perfectly likely that we'll have another one. We've had thousands in the past, and they haven't stopped yet.

It doesn't really take that much effort to prepare (as much as any human without government funds at least). Really, everyone should be doing this as it is anyway! And it's quite simple:

• Stock up on canned foods -- rotate the stock, but always keep at least 6 months supply on hand (with rationing at the least).
  
• Stock up on bottled water (or if you can find out how, bottle your own).
  
• Get battery-powered devices, "green" power (solar panels & small wind turbines), and power generators
  
• Keep a can opener and some "camping" cooking utensils by the food
  
• Keep an "emergency" food and first aid kit in every car (even if just simple camping stuff), AND at your workplace at your desk
  

Now the first time you buy the stuff, you're going to have a huge bill compared to normal. After all, you are buying enough canned goods for 6 months (assuming you eat only 1 canned item per day, that's 180 cans for one person; 300-360 for two [sharing cans], etc). And that's a LOT of cans! They'll take up the majority of anyone's pantry. It's probably best to also buy a commercial food cart to store the foods on. They come in different sizes, are designed for food storage, meet food service guidelines, many/most times are on wheels, and they're designed to hold 500-2000lbs. Why bottled water? They'll be a shortage, or just the tap will be undrinkable (not to mention high prices in stores).

Well the second the world's coming to an end (like an asteroid or some other problem) what do you think will happen? People will rush to the stores. And if you're lucky, really, really lucky the governments will put a lock on all prices before all the goods sell out. And they will. Pop, water and canned goods will be gone within minutes of an announcement. People will rush to the streets to get to the stores. Now if you stock up in advance, you'll be fine! No need to rush to the store, no need to even leave the house. All you'll need to do is make sure others don't know you have food (otherwise they'll probably break in to steal it, killing you and your family in the process). And don't let the religious people or any "good natured" people fool you. When the world comes to an end, people will revert to animalistic "kill or be killed" instincts. Your friend today will be enemy the second the world's end is near.

But it is very, very important to cycle the foods! Keep on shopping as normal. Buy foods to replenish those eaten, just put the new cans in the back -- remember oldest goods get eaten first (so push the goods forward, and stock the back). The same goes for water! Water can't be saved forever; it has an expiration date (for one reason or another). So treat it just like the other foods.

And even if the end doesn't hit in your lifetime (even though I'm betting something really "world ending" will happen by 2060), being stocked up on food is good for any "minor" disaster such as earthquake, flood, tornado, volcano, etc. And the thing is, you'll actually be eating the food, so it's not like you're wasting money (so much). Even if the government does the right thing when the end of the world's announced, by having food stores for people, do you really think they'll have enough for everyone in the country to eat for six months? Of course not! For one they figure many of the people will die. But no matter what, you'll be forced to eat whatever they give you without choice (any religion-based diets, vegetarians, etc would be pretty much, well, screwed). By stocking up now, you'll be prepared for the world's end when it happens.

But for the end of time, in a universal aspect, there's not much you could do. On the plus side, most likely no one will be around to see it. So end of time, end of the world, world's end, end of existence, extinction level event (ELE "ellie") -- whatever you want to call it, it's time to be prepared. I personally don't believe in using guns. You have a gun, neighbor has a gun, comes down to using guns the winner's the best shot or just the one who pulls the trigger first -- and really, when all life might be ending a person's survival instinct will cause them to charge a man (or woman) will a fully loaded shotgun if that person has what they need. Why? While you might shoot them (and they'd die), if they don't, they'd die; but if they charge and you miss, they live.

Now there's a lot more for the end of the world stuff that needs to be done. Much, much more. But for now I'll end it here. I have detailed plans for everything needed to survive during an end of the world event, or at the least survive longer than others, that everyone can do. And if implemented, could save the lives of almost everyone not at ground zero for the event. Of course, extinction level event method greatly influences this (i.e. planet-sized asteroid impacting = kiss butt goodbye [food or no food], small meteor striking the earth = potential for survival of almost everyone).

End of the world. Yes, the end really is near. 2012-2060

The end is near.

I'm not even talking about all those doomsday people that go around saying "the end is near!" and have been since the beginning of time. Nor am I talking about the Mayan civilization that marked the end as being December 21, 2012 (since they also said time would exist after, so if time exists after, it can't really be "the end"). Nor am I talking about Newton and the end of the world in 2060 (who some say the figure was based on religion, not science).

But it's close.

The world as we know it will end between 2012 and 2060; and after that, humans will either band together, or be like all the thousands of other animals that used to be here -- extinct.

What it's based on is just a simple prediction of probability. We're designing new and improved ways of killing ourselves off and record speeds. We haven't had a volcanic eruption (major one) in many, almost hundreds of years. We're overdue or just "any time from this second, to a thousand years" away for a major earthquake, island collapse, tsunami, volcanic eruption, meteor or comet impact, or other population reducing planetary event.

Not to mention global warming melting the ice caps which cause the earth to release methane gas (a global warming compound) which causes it to increase even more. Some scientists believe there's as much methane gas buried in ice in the permafrost and oceans as there used to be oil! Or enough to put 10x the current greenhouse gasses into the environment if it melts. Ice melts, oceans rise, land's lost, causing overcrowding and disease in the remaining lands – even less land for food, thereby causing a major reduction in the human population.

And that just assumes that it doesn't increase the intensity of weather, or kill off plants – which it does. So we'll have less to no food, less land, and the same population crowded into smaller areas. That will then be pounded by hurricanes and tornadoes. Some groups all over the world will turn to cannibalism to survive (since animals will either be killed for food, or killed by the lack of food); since humans will be the only food source that'd be "fresh".

Of course, that assumes we even live that long. As soon as the first "yes, the world's really ending" is announced ( as in the day and time is provided – in some cases to the second, others, the week), many people will become religious hoping to get some points in before they die; others will kill themselves and others , some will rape others, and others will just torture and do things – since at that point what's the worst someone could do, end their life a few days early? People will start to do whatever they want without consequence, for they know they're already condemned to die. Some will even joke about it "what are you going to do, kill me?"

And then governments will try to enforce martial law. But at that point, one where people know that everything's going to end (or at least believe it), the military personnel will have a choice: obey the government 'til they die, or go AWOL by going home and protect their family. And which do you really think someone would do? Protect someone from being shot a few minutes before they get killed by an asteroid, or hold their spouse and kids so they can be together when they die?

And it's not if it will happen, but when.

And when is between 2012 and 2060. Within these years the world as we know it will end. For some it will be the end of the world.

The worst part of the end of the world is, in many cases we can potentially prevent it, or just quickly recover and protect most the people from it. Now it depends on what world-ending event were to happen. Asteroids or comets we might be able to divert it entirely; or just evacuate the impact site while building arks throughout all the countries to help save millions/billions. Volcanoes, earthquakes, or other "no warning" types of events will have causalities. Earthquakes are currently completely unpredictable, other than saying an earthquake will hit (they happen somewhere daily, to a small extent). Volcanoes are, somewhat, obvious when they're going to erupt; they give small signs of being active, so the areas can be evacuated. But with them, you still don't know when they're erupt, only that there's an extremely likely chance it'd happen sometime within a few months. But man's impatient. So not everyone leaves, governments don't force people to leave (and actually pay them to do so, since moving does cost money), so people die.

Of course there are end of the world volcanoes on the planet (such as Yellowstone) that give signs of erupting every day! The hot springs, geysers, earthquakes, and land movements of Yellowstone would be the warning signs for other volcanoes; but for Yellowstone, it's just another normal day. At least that's what we believe. Hindsight might say that these too are warning signs, just a few thousand year warning. After all, until it erupts and destroys all the existing things there we'll never know. It's possible that after it erupts, earthquakes subside, and there's no geysers or land movement for hundreds-thousands of years! But it too will erupt again, and we are due.

If it were to go, in a massive scale, it's estimated that it would end the world as we know it. Ash would cover most of the USA in 2 meters (if I remember correctly) of ash. Not to mention the loss of a state, or more accurately, the "moving of the state to cover the world" -- well, technically the state would still exist, it'd just be unpopulated. The ash would cause millions of homes to collapse, killing those inside. Emergency vehicles wouldn't be able to move, since the engines would get blocked with ash, not to mention it's not really easy to drive through a meter high snow-covered road (without a plow), let alone ash which is more dense. Millions would die from the original eruption; millions would die from the ash (breathing it in); millions would die from buildings collapsing from the ash; millions-billions would die from starvation caused by the "nuclear winter" from the ash and gasses in the atmosphere.

It kind of makes you wonder, who's the lucky ones when a massive volcano erupts – the ones that die first without warning, or those that survive everything to keep the world going?

And that's even simplifying it all. The actual result of any world ending event would me much, much worse. It'd be one of those things that Satan itself would say "that's just wrong".

And it will happen. And soon. The world as we know it will end sometime from 2012-2060. It might even happen tomorrow, but what can I say, I'm optimistic. I'll give humanity a bit over four years left to live.

So… how do you want to die today?