2012
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2012 (MMXII) is a leap year that started on a Sunday in the Gregorian calendar, and it is the current year. It is the 2012th year of the Anno Domini (AD) and Common Era (CE) designations, the 12th year of the 3rd millennium and of the 21st century, and the 3rd of the 2010s.
2012 has been designated Alan Turing Year, commemorating the mathematician, computer pioneer, and code-breaker on the centennial of Turing's birth.[1]
There are a variety of popular beliefs about the year 2012. These beliefs range from the spiritually transformative to the apocalyptic, and center upon various interpretations of the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar. Contemporary scientists have disputed the apocalyptic versions.[2]
Predicted and scheduled events
January
- January 13–January 22 – The first Winter Youth Olympics will be held in Innsbruck, Austria.
February
- February 6 – Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II, marking the 60th anniversary of her accession to the thrones of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia & New Zealand, and the 60th anniversary of her becoming Head of the Commonwealth.
May
- May 12 – August 12 – The 2012 World Expo is to be held in Yeosu, South Korea.
June
- June 6 – The second and last solar transit of Venus of the century. The next pair are predicted to occur in 2117 and 2125.
- June 18 – June 23 – Turing Centenary Conference at the University of Cambridge, in honor of the mathematician, computer scientist, and cryptographer Alan Turing, the last day of the conference being the hundredth anniversary of his birth.[3]
July
- July 27 – August 12 – 2012 Summer Olympics held in London.
August
- August 6 – August 20 – Mars Science Laboratory also known as the Curiosity rover is scheduled to land on Mars.[4]
December
- December 21 – The Mesoamerican Long Count calendar, notably used by the pre-Columbian Mayan civilization among others, completes a "great cycle" of thirteen b'ak'tuns (periods of 144,000 days each) since the mythical creation date of the calendar's current era.
- December 31 – The first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol ends.
Date unknown
- China will launch the Kuafu spacecraft.
- 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China will be the next major Congress of the Communist Party of China.
- Pleiades, a proposed supercomputer built by Intel and SGI for NASA's Ames Research Center, will be completed, reaching a peak performance of 10 Petaflops (10 quadrillion floating point operations per second).[5]
- Sequoia, a proposed super computer built by IBM for the National Nuclear Security Administration will be completed, reaching a peak performance of 20 Petaflops.[6]
- On the Sun, the solar maximum of Solar Cycle 24 in the 11-year sunspot cycle is forecast to occur. Solar Cycle 24 is regarded to have commenced January 2008, and on average will reach its peak of maximal sunspot activity around 2012. The period between successive solar maxima averages 11 years (the Schwabe cycle), and the previous solar maximum of Solar Cycle 23 occurred in 2000–2002.[7] During the solar maximum the Sun's magnetic poles will reverse.[8]
- The Kars–Tbilisi–Baku railway across the Caucasus is scheduled to be completed sometime in 2012.[9]
Deaths
January
- January 1 – Kiro Gligorov, 1st President of the Republic of Macedonia (b. 1917)
- January 3 – Josef Škvorecký, Czech writer (b. 1924)
- January 9 – Malam Bacai Sanhá, President of Guinea-Bissau (b. 1947)
Major religious holidays
- January 6 – Christmas Day (Celebrated by the Armenian Church)
- January 7 – Christmas Day celebrated by Julian Calendar (Celebrated by some Eastern Orthodox Christians)
- February 1 – Imbolc, a Cross-quarter day (Celebrated on February 2 in some places)
- February 22 – Ash Wednesday – Western Christianity
- March 8
- March 20 – Spring Equinox, Persian New Year, also known as Ostara
- April 1 – Ramanavami – Hinduism
- April 6
- Good Friday – Western Christianity
- Hanuman Jayanti – Hinduism
- April 7 – Passover – Judaism
- April 8 – Easter – Western Christianity
- April 15 – Easter – Eastern Christianity
- April 28 – Vesākha – Buddhism
- May 1 – Beltane, a Cross-quarter day
- May 27 – Shavuot – Judaism
- June 20 – Summer solstice, also known as Midsummer
- July 20 – Ramadan begins – Islam
- August 1 – Lammas, a Cross-quarter day
- August 2 – Raksha Bandhan – Hinduism
- August 10 – Janmashtami – Hinduism
- August 19 – Eid al Fitr – Islam
- September 17 – Rosh Hashanah – Judaism
- September 21 – Autumn Equinox, also known as Mabon
- September 26 – Yom Kippur – Judaism
- October 1 – Sukkot – Judaism
- October 2 – Mehregan – Zoroastrianism and Persian Culture
- October 24 – Vijaya Dashami/Dusshera – Hinduism
- October 26 – Eid al-Adha, a religious festival in Islam
- November 1 – Samhain, a Cross-quarter day, Neopagan new year and Christian All Saints' Day
- November 13 – Diwali – Hinduism
- November 15 – Islamic New Year
- December 9 – Hanukkah – Judaism
- December 21 – Winter solstice, also known as Yule
- December 25 – Christmas – Western Christianity
In fiction
See also
References
- ^ "TurningCentenary.eu". Turingcentenary.eu. April 9, 2010. Retrieved June 2, 2010.
- ^ "2012: Beginning of the End or Why the World Won't End?". NASA.
- ^ "Swan.ac.uk". Cs.swan.ac.uk. July 24, 2009. Retrieved June 2, 2010.
- ^ "NASA's Next Mars Rover Hoisted Atop Rocket". Space.com. Retrieved November 4, 2011.
- ^ "NASA, Intel, SGI Plan to 'Soup Up' Supercomputer". Nas.nasa.gov. Retrieved June 2, 2010.
- ^ Gonsalves, Antone. "IBM Tapped For 20-Petaflop Government Supercomputer". Informationweek.com. Retrieved June 2, 2010.
- ^ Phillips, Tony (January 10, 2008). "Solar Cycle 24 Begins". Science@NASA. NASA. Retrieved April 6, 2009.
- ^ "The Sun Does a Flip". Science@NASA. NASA. February 15, 2001. Retrieved April 6, 2009.
- ^ National Geographic, August 2010, page 62.