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Web Site Selling "Earthquake Forecasts"
waytoomuchcoffee writes "The San Francisco Chronicle is running a story on geoForecaster.com, a site that offers 'earthquake forecasts,' for a fee. California is looking into claims that the site is practicing geology without a license."
Is that a joke or what, I am astounded that there is a law against someone "practicing geology without a license", I'm interested, what does it take to get a "geology license", how much does it cost? What if someone in japan hosted a site predicting earthquakes in california, what then? This whole thing seems rather bizarre to me.
I would expect such blatant racism on Fark, but on Slashdot? Mods please ban this asshole.
The NEIC gives you all the data you need to predict your own Earthquake as accurately as any other internet-diploma geologist.
I can understand needing a licence to practice medicine or do brain surgery, because you could kill someone.. or even a licence to be an architect or a lawyer because you could seriously injure or screw people up if you go wrong.
But doing scientific research into the planet? What is there to screw up there? Measuring some vibrations is hardly life-threatening, even if the quake turns out to be.
Watch out, they'll make you get a licence to be able to program soon.
mogorific carpentry experiments
Woohoo...too bad I didn't get this in my previous posting (see above). Check this out... this comes from the Earthquakes FAQ from the Quake Tracker website created by Michael Kozuch, the guy responsible for geoForecaster.com:
4. Can earthquakes be predicted?
It is possible to estimate where big earthquakes are likely in the next 50 to 100 years, based on geological investigations and the historical record of earthquakes. However, it is not yet possible to accurately predict the time and location of the next earthquake. A number of physical changes have been observed before some earthquakes, but the problem is that so far, no particular change has been noted consistently. Some scientists have observed changes in the earth's magnetic and electric fields, gas emissions, changes in water well levels, and changes in the levels of dissolved gases in groundwater. Other scientists have noted changes in the frequency and location of small earthquakes. A very small number of earthquakes have been successfully predicted. The most notable success was near Haicheng, China in 1975, where 90,000 people were evacuated a few hours before an earthquake that destroyed 90 percent of the buildings. The prediction was based on unusual animal behaviour and a greatly increased number of small earthquakes (foreshocks) that suddenly stopped. One of the animal observations was that snakes came out of hibernation and died due to the cold. It is now thought that this was caused by unseasonably warm weather. However, scientists wrongly predicted a major quake in Kwantung Province, and for two months millions of people lived in tents before authorities decided the prediction was wrong. Later in 1976, an unpredicted quake, magnitude 7.8, in China's Tangshan Province took 250,000 lives. It was the most disastrous earthquake this century. Since then, China has moved its resources away from earthquake prediction and into improving the earthquake resistance of buildings.
I find it highly amusing that the FAQ page of the website hosting his earlier project says you can't predict an earthquake. I guess he didn't read the page.