The following article is an excerpt from the Washington Post: David Morrison is a real NASA scientist who studies real planets and makes real discoveries about the real universe. Unfortunately for him, Morrison’s duties also include debunking perennial Internet theories that a fake planet is about to destroy the Earth, which was supposed to happen in 2003, then 2012, then Sept. 23, then October — and now the world is supposed to end again sometime Sunday. And the astronomer sounds like he’s just about had it.
“You’re asking me for a logical explanation of a totally illogical idea,” Morrison said on this week’s SETI Institute podcast, after the hosts asked for his take on the third scheduled apocalypse in three months. “There is no such planet, there has never been, and presumably there never will be — but it keeps popping up over and over.” We can understand his frustration. Based on just enough pseudoscience to capture the popular imagination, the theory claims that a planet (or “black star”) called Nibiru (or Planet X) is orbiting the outer fringes of our solar system. READ MORE
