Glen, I tend to agree with you. Michael, I thought Steve's use of the phrase "constructive criticism" was honest; I do not think he was in any way trying to be snide. Furthermore, I find your attitude about amateur predictors a tad harsh. Certain earthquakes have indeed been predicted by amateurs (Don in Hollister has successfully predicted a few, as has Shan), and I, myself, warned people about the 1971 Sylmar quake the night before it happened. Please don't auatomatically dismiss us as deluded or worse.

Ego sometimes does enter into the equation, (we all have seen instances of that beast at work, even on this board), but there was no ego involved in my overwhelming sense of dread on the night of February 8, 1972. Don't ask me how I knew that earthquake was coming; I couldn't tell you. But to dismiss amateur predictors de facto as suffering from some kind of conceit or worse seems a bit extreme. Some are making honest attempts to crack that nut, and some have even been successful on occasion. What is missing in most cases is track record. (As a side note, I have never successfully predicted another earthquake, even though I have occasionally tried. Even looking at instrumentation, my record is poor, so my one success I have to consider an anomaly.)

This *is* a prediction board, so I am glad to see people here making predictions. We can all learn, even by failures, which, admittedly, outnumber the successes astronomically. For earthquake prediction to be possible, I think it is going to rely on multiple data to be analyzed, not by one single factor alone.

I think I am babbling, now, and have the sense that I am not expressing myself well. I have a massive headache and should probably get off the computer and go lie down. Excuses, excuses. Still, I'm sorry if this post is rambling. I just think we should encourage those trying to predict earthquakes, whether amateur or professional, rather than dismiss them out of hand as self agrandizing or delusional, though we have all seen instances in which those terms would be considered applicable.

Getting off my soap box now.

Cathryn