That's when the aliens come back for the harvest.

Yummy :)

orbital period?

question, how long does it take the solar system to perform an orbit of the galaxy? also while doing so, wouldn't we be passing in and out of the spiral arms (I believe they are waves of compression and do not orbit at the same rate) and therefore in and out of material which would block the sun's output significantly.

16 million years

That's a long time to wait before we can welcome our new species-extinguishing overlords.

What? You mean Keanu Reeves might have actually

gotten something right in a movie?

I for one welcome, etc. etc.

The end is nigh

Well, it's nearer today than yesterday.

Not new but ...

Yes, I remember 20 years ago reading about the theory. It was already proven that there was a catastrophy every 27million years.

But maybe it's a reboot-script of Earth? Initialize every 27 million years hehehe.

Dalek says:

*It begins!*

could be sooner we think...

Could be that 27 million years is how long it takes the average dominant species to get all curious about the mass of the higgs boson....

mine's the one with the neatly folded tin foil hat in the pocket

I for one...

"The next dotted line is due in 16 million years, but the associated extinction could be as much as 10 million years early."

Has anyone thought to consult our new cephalopod mollusk overlord (the one they call "Paul"), he might be able to give a more accurate predication.

:o)

Dubious

This science sounds to me about as rigorous as some of the climate science stuff. Looks to me like they've come up with a theory that that there's a big extinction every 27 million years and then taken a very random looking graph and allowed themselves a lot of leeway to fit their theory onto it. Did they try values other than 27 million years and (with that same flexibility) see if they fitted too? Or produce random computer generated graphs and see if they could squeeze the 27 million year fit to them too.

My money's on that extinction graph being completely random and very noisy so with sufficient fudging you could fit pretty much anything on it.

Strange?

Isn't it supposed to be just after all the telephone sanitisers are got rid of?

Wait a minute, where *are* all the telephone sanitisers?

Mine's got a copy of H2G2 in the pocket.

And The Mayans ....

... are saying we're in year 26,999,998. Or there about.

Easy answer...

If it's not Nemesis then it must be a Zombie Apocalypse!

Mines the one with the pockets full of 12 guage cartridges.

What?

OK I think I WILL have that cup of tea after all.

Phew

Well then, just enough time to watch Lord of the rings extended edition again...

Asimov's nemesis

Somebody has been reading too much Asimov ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nemesis_%28Isaac_Asimov_novel%29

Unscheduled disaster?

Should we schedule them, then?

Oh my god, quick!!

Someone has put a graph in a scientific paper.

We don't really understand it, and the model just says we are all going to die, but we don't understand the model, or know if it is right.

Quick!! - rush in lots of "Nemesis" taxes. We must be seen to do something. Also enough worrying about this will make people forget about section 44...

Everyone knows what this really is.

Them there aliens set their (highly inaccurate) watches and make sure that no life gets to intelligent on this little planet in an out of the way solar system.

Tin foil hats anyone? Though I doubt it will help with the rain of comets / asteroids.

Douglas Adams

It's "The Coming of the Great White Handkerchief".

Another statistician writes ...

The graph quite clearly demonstrates that extinctions are dying out ....

Statistics

I doubt any statistician was involved in the publication of this factoid. A statistician would have pointed out the existence of the Poisson process.

Stats fail

Anyone could generate a similar theory by conjuring a randomised graph and picking out regular-ish peaks. There's nothing 'regular' or 'ordered' about those peaks.

All it proves is that extinctions occur, at a varying scale (which we knew anyway), sometimes correlating to the theory of 'mass extinctions' (which is statistically logical anyway).

Related to this article: This paranoia-fuelled theory that the BP Gulf disaster will trigger a 'world-killing' methane bubble event. Both theories are based in truth, but utilise dubious physics and statistics to reach incredible conclusions.

http://www.helium.com/items/1882339-doomsday-how-bp-gulf-disaster-may-have-triggered-a-world-killing-event

Use Fourier Analysis!

Take the power spectrum of the sequence. If there's really a 27-My periodicity, there will be a spike at that frequency in the spectrum. If there isn't, thre won't be. If it's not an exact 27My cycle the peak will be broadened and not as high, but still above background noise. If it's wishful thinking, there will be no noticeable peak.

I have to express doubt as to how accurately they can date extinction events hundreds of My past. It would oh so easy to allow belief in an extinction cycle to "close up" the error bars. 270My +/- 8My, rather than 270My +/- 14My, say. (The latter could not significantly support the theory, because the deviation covers an entire cycle).

18 times???

Out of the twenty 27-million-year markers shown on the graph, about 8 (depending on how fussy you are) don't really have an associated mass-extinction. Two of the circles appear to be (fairly) precisely in the middle of two of the markers, and two markers have a pair of extinctions.

There is no way I can see 18 occurrences no matter how generous I am. And how anybody can describe this as "regularity of the extinctions" is beyond me - looks like complete rubbish.

27 million years to go....

....Only problem is they should have told us 26,999,999 years and 364 days ago... Goodnight everyone and Waiter, Check Please!!!!

Flippin' Poles

Geology tells us that the Earth's Poles can move about and actually swap position over long periods of time. This would remove the Earth's vital magnetosphere, which protects all life from deadly radiation emanating from our Sun.

Recent studies have confirmed that the Poles have been moving over the last few years although many of them have gone back home again having been disenchanted by crappy weather and poor quality lager.

Oh no!

27 million years? I've got a plumber booked then!