Today's 2012 fun 'facts'

Definition: [Astrological Ages] The idea that the current 'age' of the Mayan 'Long Count' calendar was designed by them to end on 21-Dec-2012 because that is the date of a Winter Solstice alignment of the Sun and the Galaxy. This idea was first promoted by John Major Jenkins in his book Maya Cosmogenesis 2012 [published in 1998]. The steps of the argument appear to be as follows:

1: The Maya used what is now called a 'Long Count' calendar, of which the current longest cycle is dated to end on the 21 December 2012.
2: The Maya particularly picked an end date of this cycle [rather than a start date] because they had calculated that on that date the Sun would be in the 'exact center of the Milky Way, the Galactic Equator' [1]. In Mayan thought this 'dark cleft of the Milky Way' [1] had particular mythical significance.
3: In order to set this end date the Maya must have been able to calculate very exactly the Precession of the Equinoxes, because it is this phenomenon which appears to move the Winter Solstice Sun around the Ecliptic to be in the significant place in 2012.