Will 2012 be the end of the world?

People just assume that because the Mayan calendar ends on december 21st 2012 that means the world will end
The thing is, however that the calendar is updated every 500 years or so by the Mayans but the mayans were wiped out a long time ago so the calendar wasn't able to be updated

I really don't believe the world is ever going to end. However, I do believe this system of things will come to it's demise.

Hence world war III D|

The sky shall open up and the walls of the governments shall crumble before them.

Sounds like the end will be caused by E.T.

That information is not completely incorrect. The Mayan calandar ends by 2012 because that's when the current and 13th baktun ends and the next one begins. However, in the Mayan book of creation Popol Vuh, it describes the gods creating three worlds but all failed and were destroyed. We are now in the fourth world, which will end at the start of the 14th baktun, which happen to be at December 21 2012. It will end with the destruction of the world in the form of a great flood (which was shown graphically in an acient Maya Temple). The Maya's made several predictions, one of which is that the period before December 21 2012, will see many natural disasters in the form of tsunami's, vulcanic eruptions and earthquakes and looking back the last couple of months, they might just be right.