2012: Science Or Superstition (2008)

Graham Hancock is the author of the major international bestsellers 'The Sign and The Seal,' 'Fingerprints of the Gods,' 'Supernatural' and 'Heaven's Mirror.' His books have sold more than five million copies worldwide and have been translated into 27 languages. His public lectures and TV appearances, including the three-hour series 'Quest For The Lost Civilisation,' have put his ideas before audiences of tens of millions. He has become recognized as an unconventional thinker who raises legitimate questions about humanity's history and prehistory and offers an increasingly popular challenge to the entrenched views of orthodox scholars.

John Major Jenkins is an independent researcher who has devoted himself to reconstructing ancient Mayan cosmology and philosophy. Since 1986, John has traveled to Mexico and Central America seven times. In 1990 he helped build a school in San Pedro, near Lake Atitlan in Guatemala. In 1994 he delivered relief supplies to a Quiché Maya community in the Western highlands of Guatemala. Since beginning his odyssey of research and discovery with the Maya, John has authored dozens of articles and many books, including 'Maya Cosmogenesis 2012' (1998) and 'Galactic Alignment: The Transformation of Consciousness According to Mayan, Egyptian, and Vedic Traditions' (2002).

Author Daniel Pinchbeck was a founder of the 1990s literary magazine Open City and has written for many publications, including Esquire, The New York Times Magazine, The Village Voice, and Rolling Stone. In 1994, he was chosen by The New York Times Magazine as one of Thirty Under Thirty destined to change our culture.

His latest book, '2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl,' is a literary and metaphysical epic that binds together the cosmological phenomena of our time to support the contention of the Mayan calendar that the year 2012 portends an unprecedented global shift.

Pinchbeck lives in New York s East Village, where he is editorial director of Reality Sandwich. He is co-creator of the animation project, PostModern Times.

Alberto Villoldo, PhD, is a medical anthropologist who has spent the last 25 years investigating the healing practices of the shamans of the Amazon and the Andes. He is the founder of the Four Winds Society, an organization dedicated to the bridging of ancient shamanic traditions with modern medicine and psychology.

He is the author of over 10 books, including 'Shaman, Healer, Sage'; 'Mending the Past and Healing the Future with Soul Retrieval'; 'The Four Insights'; 'Yoga, Power and Spirit' and 'Courageous Dreaming.' He makes available a complex body of shamanic knowledge in an elegant and accessible manner.

Lawrence E. Joseph was formerly the chairman of an advanced plasma physics research and development company in Albuquerque, New Mexico. As a writer Joseph has written for, among other publications, The New York Times, Salon.com, Family Circle, Audubon, Art News, Discover and Diversion.

He is the author of several books including 'Gaia: The Growth of an Idea' (1990) and 'Apocalypse 2012' (2007), a New York Times bestseller. He is currently writing a follow up entitled '2012: The Aftermath.'

Anthony F. Aveni is the Russell B. Colgate Professor of Astronomy and Anthropology, serving appointments in both Departments of Physics and Astronomy and Sociology and Anthropology at Colgate University, where he has taught since 1963. Dr. Aveni helped develop the field of archaeoastronomy and now is considered one of the founders of Mesoamerican Archaeoastronomy, in particular for his research in the astronomical history of the Maya Indians of ancient Mexico. Dr. Aveni is a lecturer, speaker, and editor/author of over two dozen books on ancient astronomy.

December 21, 2012: the end date of the sophisticated Long Count Calendar created by the ancient Maya in central America. Countless books and websites, magazine articles and newspaper headlines debate its meaning, with enthusiasts in two camps: those forecasting apocalypse the end of time and those who see a coming renewal, a rebirth of consciousness.

Adding fuel to the debate, some scientists see the increasing number of natural disasters in recent years as evidence of a catastrophic climax of events in 2012. How much of what we re hearing is science and how much is superstition? In this film the leading researchers, writers and scientists in the field tell us exactly what this date means to them, why it s important, and what we should expect.

Featured in the film are Graham Hancock, John Major Jenkins, Daniel Pinchbeck, Alberto Villoldo, Anthony Aveni, Robert Bauval, Jim Marrs, Walter Cruttenden, Lawrence E. Joseph, Douglas Rushkoff, John Anthony West and Benito Vegas Duran.