Hi John,

The only thing that keeps earthquake prediction at bay are people. If you say these words often enough, eventually you'll believe them. "Earthquakes cannot be predicted."

Don has said this before, but as no one seems to be listening, let me say it again. He used the data provided to him and made predictions on this site for a little over a year. While Lowell did evaluate them, they were wide open for anyone elses opinion. All you have to do is have a look around the archives of this site and you'll find them and you can see how often he predicted low end magnitude quakes and got hits.

Roger Hunter is willing to do the evaluation, however, due to working massive over-time I have not had the time to gather the reports and give them to him. And presently I am well aware he is to busy on his projects to look at them. But it is not something that cannot be done later.

I do not wish for you to trash my friends. Lowell Whiteside (not Whitehead) is a very good friend of mine and has been for years. Yes, I agree that he does not stick his feet in the mud and stay there forever. He looks objectively at everything and see's many correlations.

Now as for Jim Berkland, he is a close friend as well and lives just over the hill from me. He is a terrific geology teacher and a true humanitarian. He's stuck his neck out far more times than anyone else and though it may not meet with scientific approval, he's doing it his way.

I know you have to hold the party line, but there is another line. The line of friends, people who care about others and are willing to go the distance for them. That is what Whiteside and Berkland have in common. I'm glad they're my friends and I'm proud to say I know both of them.

I am willing to sit on the bench and see what geoForecaster has to offer and how they do in the days ahead. It is a new approach to an old problem, but I cannot see any way possible it could hold back progress on prediction. So far the science community as a whole has done a really good job at that. Let us not forget those who have tried and been tried for their attempts.

Do you remember when the polio vaccine was first delivered for public consumption? Probably not. But it wasn't perfect in those days and quite a number got polio and some died. Today it is as safe as can be. So if geoForecaster isn't perfect yet, give them time and I think they will be.

Let us turn this negative around and say these words instead, "earthquakes can be predicted and in more than one way."

Is Monday over yet?

Petra