No basis for any conceivable threat

So. It seems the world hasn't ended at 8:30 this morning, after all. Maybe we'll have to wait until October.
This reminded me of the Y2K scare - the world would end because computers couldn't deal with the millennium. Is science getting too scary these days? We fear what we don't understand (not that I understand precisely what they are doing, but I understand why, and I approve).
However - if the world as we know it really did end this morning, if we were at this moment on our way towards an event horizon, would we realize it? Or would our senses not be able to make sense of it, would we change with the changes?

Ages ago - in fact, so long ago that I can't remember neither author nor title nor whether I read it in German or English - I read a rather harrowing Science Fiction story, where an experiment was taking place, again one where the danger of it affecting the whole world was possible. I think it may have involved time travel, but I am not sure, but I seem to remember some turning motion in the apparatus described. Of course, there were lab-coated scientists around conducting the experiment. With each turning, or permutation, something subtly changed in their environment, until they became weird, tentacled, Bosch-inspired creatures, their lab turned into something unrecognizable as architecture, the sky purple, the sun blue... you get my drift.
The punch line, of course, was that they didn't SEE these changes, as they and their minds were changed too. "You see!", crowed the head researcher, waving his primary tentacle towards the cluster of his doubting assistant in triumph, "You were wrong! Nothing has changed, nothing at all!"

It is indeed a disturbing thought.


(PS: Should you recognize the story, please tell me what it is!)

In other news...

... I lol'd...

( ... at this. )