Tonight over drinks a friend casually mentions that he's been reading about secret societies and the teleology of the ancient Mayans, who, with their ultra-accurate calendars, predicted the world would end in 2012. "Depressing," he says, and he's partly right.

And yet it seems far more compelling to me that "The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that by 2008 two-thirds of the people of sub-Saharan Africa will be undernourished, and 40 percent will be undernourished in Asia." and "Eight hundred million people go to bed hungry each night" (Alternatives to Economic Globalization, report of the IFG).

Metaphysical questions are important to consider (shepherds, with their empiest of lives, once spent their empty nights contemplating stars, filling themselves), but if they have a dampening effect on our psyche then we're weighing them too heavily. If there is an invisible world then failure to see it accurately can't be a flaw. If a comet comes in 2012 and I pass to the(/an) other side and the great spirit says, "You fool! Didn't you read about the Mayans and their calendar?" I shall answer: "No. You fool. I lived my life. I was happy, awhile. I made things. I acted well, in reference to the things I could see."