People have complained in the past that they could not understand my earthquake triggering and precursor signal generation theories. Well, those theories may have just increased in complexity by a factor of 2 or more. So if you could not understand them in the past then I am afraid that the problem has now gotten worse. Additionally, I have been saying that parts of those theories might be 10 to 25 years more advanced than what other researchers are doing. If this latest potentially important discovery is actually right then those theories just jumped ahead another 5 years in time.

While checking the EarthWaves directory system to determine what might be the best way to store that new earthquake probability program for downloads I came across a file which I understand contains part of Dr. Lowell Whiteside's graduate thesis. I am preparing a report on earthquake triggering and forecasting and decided to read it. When Dr. Whiteside was posting notes here he discussed some of the topics in his thesis. But the material was fragmented. And I could not really follow what he was saying. His actual thesis has that information presented in a more cohesive manner.

My forecasting program and earthquake triggering theories are based in part on two groups of triggering and signal generation cycles which are about 30 days and 25 hours in length. And those cycles match certain sun and moon rotation cycles as shown in my Wave Charts which can be seen in the 90-03.html file at one of my Web sites.

The 30 day cycles also have subcycles which are about 7 days long. And the 25 hour cycles have subcycles which are about 6.25 hours long.

I have found that there were some problems with getting the observed triggering and signal generation cycles to match exactly with the lunar cycles etc. and some other types of problems. For one thing there appeared to be a type of slow drift in the length of the triggering cycles compared with the lunar cycles.

In his thesis Dr. Whiteside stated that there is another cycle which is about the same length. Astrophysics is not my specialty area. And I was not aware of the existence of that cycle.

It is the sun rotation cycle on its "North and South Pole axis" if you can call it that. The cycle is about 27 days long, close to the length of the lunar cycles. And if I understood the information correctly, surrounding the sun there are four regions of magnetic activity which reverse their direction relative to a fixed point in space as the sun rotates on its axis. The Earth position could be considered a fixed point in space relative to a 27 day rotation cycle. And so roughly every 7 days the Earth would move from a region were the sun's magnetic field orientation was in one direction to another where it was in the opposite direction.

The transition from one region to another is apparently quite abrupt.

The theories which Dr. Whiteside discussed propose that those alternating magnetic region changes combined with solar and geomagnetic storms are having a number of potential earthquake triggering effects. They affect the rotation of the Earth. And they affect the locations where solar and geomagnetic storm energy etc. are able to concentrate. Fault zones in the affected areas can be heated by that energy resulting in earthquakes occurring perhaps 4 days after some strong geomagnetic storms.

As I said, this subject matter is already tremendously complex. And without going into more detail I will just say that this sun related alternating magnetic region phenomenon might explain some of the earthquake triggering and precursor signal generation observations I have been making such as signal polarity reversals. For one example, you might hear an Ear Tone in one ear and then 6.25 hours later you might hear it in the other ear. I have had that happen on a number of occasions. The Earth rotates about 90 degrees every 6 hours relative to the sun. And without actually knowing if this is the case I will propose that it is possible that the sun - Earth magnetic field interaction for a specific location such as a fault zone might be changing direction during that period of time.

So, what I need to now do is try to find a source of information regarding when those sun magnetic field reversals are occurring. And then I might try to add those data to my Wave Charts. Perhaps at that time they will demonstrate exact matches with the earthquake triggering and signal generation cycle times.

I suspect that it is also likely that the position of the moon in the sky relative to the sun would still be important to earthquake triggering etc. There are gravity effects. And it is possible that the moon somehow causes the sun magnetic field boundary to shift one way or another.

With a related subject, we have never been able to explain exactly what is responsible for the sun shadow shifts that Shan is observing with his earthquake forecasting program. This sun - Earth magnetic field interaction might explain his observations if it is in fact causing the Earth's crust to periodically move a little faster or slower and in the process affecting earthquake triggering times. And it might explain why his forecasts are accurate only a certain percentage of the time.

Dr. Whiteside stated (I believe) that the sun magnetic field region positions are also affected by the locations of the planets and other heavenly bodies. So that theory might help explain why people have been so insistent over the years that there are correlations between planetary positions and earthquake triggering.

And he stated that it would be difficult to distinguish between sun magnetic region and lunar gravity related earthquake triggering effects as they have about the same cycles lengths. I believe that it should probably be possible to tell them apart through the use of the data evaluation procedures which I have developed.

Finally, in an effort to avoid the debates which often seem to follow this type of report I will explain that although I said that this could be an important discovery I am not trying to say that I invented those sun magnetic field - earthquake triggering theories. The important discovery that I feel that I just made is the fact that they exist. And now I am going to have to try to determine the extent to which they apply to the work that I am doing.

These are personal opinions.