Originally Posted by Some Guy

The Mayans, along with a few other cultures, predicted that the end of the fifth epoch of human civilization would come on or around December 21st, 2012. According to them, there had been four previous epochs, with our modern time being the fifth. The great flood and the black plague were two of the horrible occurrances that nearly wiped humans out in the past. Apparently something big is going to happen soon to wipe us out again and "reset" the planet.