Hi EQF,

You sound a little frustrated. Sorry about that. But you know, they are organized. When Don and I go to the AGU, we sit in on lectures on given topics and one presenter after the next will discuss a certain segment on the topic. One of this year is an entire afternoon discussing Earthscope. I am more than pleased to have the opportunity to learn about this new project, where it is now and what lies ahead in the future.

As I have no idea where you are located, other than you are not in California or any other place which has a strong geological institution for geophysics, I think you may be out of the loop, in regard to how our scientists work and how they do it together.

If you'll ever notice, most papers which are not written solely, but with a group of normally three or more scientists, with a lot of reference material. Obviously, not a singular effort.

However, in regard to forecasting or predicting earthquakes, for the most part, you are not going to see this on sci-geo earthquakes because this is an issue that is to hot to put out in public. It is not accepted today for the most part in mainstream science and the consequences for hanging out on a limb are too great. Therefore, I think you're looking in the wrong place for support on this issue.

I would strongly recommend that you join the AGU, or the SSA and receive your monthly newsletters which discuss current theories and recent papers. And if at all possible, place yourself in the position where you can talk face to face with a scientist regarding the subjects you feel are important, such as lunar gravity anomolies.

Trying to attempt an important discussion on a given matter by e-mail is mostly fruitless as they don't know you and they have a genuine concern about anything they might tell you in writing. For instance, when you send out e-mail warnings about impending earthquakes, the scientists who receive this mail most likely will not discuss anything with you because they would be fearful of your use of the information. However, if you ask them a question about a topic they are well versed upon, then you might be able to open a dialogue with that person. But first they have to know who you are and that you can be trusted with the information. To many times in the past, they have been taken out of context by doomsday sayers and it puts them in a bad light.

Lastly, we should all remember, most scientists are not 9 to 5ers, they work all of the time because they love their work. They are virtually workaholics. Many of them also work in high seismic risk zones, so if anyone wants to know when they think the next quake will arrive, its them. So often they don't have time for e-mail discussions with people they don't know.

I can understand your sense of the lack of progress, because I've been there, but I learned how to walk around the wheel, instead of trying to drive it.

Petra