#52: Harold Camping

Harold Camping is a radio evangelist who runs the Family Radio network. Camping believes that the popular notion that the world will end in 2012 (in alleged accordance with the Mayan calendar) is ridiculous. Sounds reasonable, right?

The reason it is ridiculous, according to Camping, is that this date ”has not one stitch of biblical authority, it's like a fairy tale." No, the real date for the end of the world, according to Harold Camping, is May 21, 2011. Why? Well the reasoning is soundproof numerology.

The number 5, Camping concluded, equals "atonement." Ten is "completeness." Seventeen means "heaven." Camping patiently explained how he reached his conclusion for May 21, 2011.

"Christ hung on the cross April 1, 33 A.D.," he began. "Now go to April 1 of 2011 A.D., and that's 1,978 years." Camping then multiplied 1,978 by 365.2422 days - the number of days in each solar year, not to be confused with a calendar year. Next, Camping noted that April 1 to May 21 encompasses 51 days. Add 51 to the sum of previous multiplication total, and it equals 722,500. Camping realized that (5 x 10 x 17) x (5 x 10 x 17) = 722,500. Or put into words: (Atonement x Completeness x Heaven), squared.

It isn’t his first stab. He won notoriety for predicting the return of Christ on September 6. 1994 as well. When reality failed to accommodate the map, he modified his "prophecy" to claim that that September 6 was the day that God removed his Holy Spirit from the earth and that nobody could be saved after this date and that God was calling all those already saved to exit the organized churches.

Mentioned here.

And here.

Diagnosis: A total whacko, Camping has taken confirmation bias and category mistakes to a level of clinical insanity. Should be non-influential, but this guy does own quite a lot of radio stations spewing forth his nonsense. Astonishing.