Post deleted by Mat Sklansky

[Neuge]

The magnetic field reversal is nowhere near regular and there's no way to pin it down to a specific year. The period length has spanned over three orders of magnitude in the past. It's like predicting a major earthquake: we may be overdue for one and there may be indications that one is imminent, but there's no way we can say one is going to happen tomorrow (yet).

I suspect the article you read had a good deal of Mayan mythology in it.

[rubberloon]

Precession of the equinox has nothing to do with magnetic reversals. IIRC the last magnetic reversal was about 750,000 years ago as shown by seafloor spreading. It is believed that the earth's magnetic field is currently weakening and that there could be another magnetic reversal in the near future say the next two thousand years or so, but this is an informed guess, and may not be true. It is also thought that during the reversal the earth's magnetic field is zero or close to it with interesting side effects, for how long is not known, years or decades perhaps.

[Zeno]

You are mixing natual phenomena that are unrelated. The precession of the equinoxes is caused by the differential gravitational forces of the Sun and the Moon on the Earth. Magnetic reversals are a change in polarity of the earth's magnetic field generated by the molten core of the planet.


To follow up on rubberloon's post here are some good links for explanation:

Magnetic Reversals (http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/reversals.html)


Procession of the Equinoxes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precession_of_the_equinoxes)

As added information there is also the Chandler Wobble:

"Originally it was believed that the wobble was caused by seasonal weather fluctuations causing shifts in atmospheric mass distribution, or possible geophysical movement beneath Earth's crust. On 18 July 2000, however, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced that "the principal cause of the Chandler wobble is fluctuating pressure on the bottom of the ocean, caused by temperature and salinity changes and wind-driven changes in the circulation of the oceans."

LINK: Chandler Wobble (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandler_wobble)

-Zeno