Planet X/Nibiru - appearing in 2012?

[Wicket]

Can anyone tell me if there is any truth in there being this 'extra' planet that is supposed to make an appearance in 2012. If so what are the implications?

[skep]

According to David Morrison, Senior Scientist at the NASA Astrobiology Institute:

Nibiru does not exist. NASA has never discovered or detected Nibiru or anything remotely like it. The handful of dwarf planets that astronomers have discovered beyond Neptune are on stable orbits that will never come into the inner solar system, let alone threaten Earth. Nothing will happen in 2012. Nibiru is simply a fake, a hoax, the result of a small religious cult that is unfortunately scaring lots of people with totally false stories.

[Wicket]

That's interesting, thanks for the reply. There's all sorts of stuff 'out there' including footage that NASA have apparently doctored. This planet will apparently appear from nowhere but surely it would be visible by now if coming in 2012?

I've heard a lot about 2012 and 'the end of the world'. The ending of the Mayan calendar, that sort of thing??

[skep]

There are a few good skeptical sites out there that have more information on these topics than I could post here in a hundred years 

As for the planet x thing, Phil Plait does a pretty good job of taking it apart on his Bad Astronomy website http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/planetx/nutshell.html

The problem with these grand conspiracy theories is that they tend to collapse under their own weight.  Here is an interesting article on conspiracy theories (it deals specifically with 9-11 but the premise is the same) http://factspluslogic.com/articles/11/why-argue-the-911-conspiracy-theory

The Mayan calendar misinterpretation is covered fairly comprehensively here http://www.skepdic.com/maya.html

Happy reading.