Dear Spider,

If the seismologist delivered the prediction and remained anonomous, then it would be untraceable and thus, no credit for success or failure could be delivered for or against the predictor.

This is one of the issues I'm covering in one of my books I'm writing. In my case the predictor/seismologist does go to the earthquake evaluation council and asks for an alert. But as he has no track record, the council refuses. Thousands die in the earthquake that should have been predicted. This someone takes up the stand in a legal sense and asks, "does a single seismologist have a right to issue a public earthquake prediction, when he feels certain the data supports the prediction." The case goes to the Supreme Court with the 9th Justice delivering the verdict. Do people who live in seismic risk zones have a right to have earthquake prediction? I have no doubt that before 2025, this question will be presented and answered, hopefully on the side of citizens and seismologists as well.

Let one's conscious be their guide. Do you save the lives of people you are nearly certain will perish, or does one fail in their ability to afford them a warning they should never have missed?

All to often we become witnesses to the victims of earthquakes, but they are somewhere else, someone elses sorrows, their family, their friends, their co-workers. Just nameless marks in an earthquake catalog, unloved, uncared for, unremembered. Voices in the wind. No one wants to rememember, because to do so, gives them a sense of mortality. But if you do remember, then you know, it doesn't have to be that way. People can survive by two means. One is preparation and the other is with a warning.

If a child was walking across the street and a car approaching looked like it might strike the child and you had a whistle, would you blow the whistle as loud as you could to get the drivers attention, or stand by and watch the driver strike the child? Earthquake prediction is this senario, but with many parameters. Ten witnesses to an accident will tell you ten different stories because each one saw something slightly different. But combined, the conclusions are irrefutable.

I weigh heavily on the side of taking a chance of being wrong, and if put in a proper perspective, giving someone a chance to live another day and everyone they love, the chance to be there to enjoy having them there. To love people, whether you know them or not, is the answer. You have to care for the value of a human life, tantamount to taking a chance, they might not survive without the warning.

Lots of food for thought on this issue, has been for years and may be for the next ten years, but somewhere along the way, a few brave individuals are going to take a leap of faith, not unlike our brave men who walked on the Moon, and they're going to predict an earthquake and see, it is possible, after all.

May God speed in this process.

Pat in Petaluma