7 Doomsday Scenarios You Probably Shouldn't Worry About (And 2 You Really Should)

3. The Poles Switching

This was a weird one to capture the headlines, but it certainly did.

Whilst it's correct that the magnetic poles of our planet are on the move and that they could well switch at some point, the chance of this bringing about the end of days is significantly less likely.

The magnetic poles tend to constantly wander about the Earth anyway and in the last 150 years, the pole has wandered a total of about 685 miles. Data from ESA observations of the magnetosphere also seem to indicate that we're in for a geomagnetic reversal. This isn't a sudden process and, once started, our magnetosphere would be in for 100 to 1,000 years of chaotic upheaval.

This would mess up the navigation systems of animals that use the magnetosphere to find their way and it would probably mess with with some navigational systems - using a compass to get about is definitely out. There are also those who think that it would leave us more vulnerable to the dangerous solar winds that our magnetosphere currently deflects and bring about an extinction event.

This, however, is more conjecture than observation. Geomagnetic reversal is actually relatively common and there is nothing in the fossil record to suggest that previous similar events had any effect on the biosphere at all. A great many of the species alive today were also present during the last switch up and they did just fine.