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Earthquakes Cannot Be Predicted
Abstract
Can the time, location, and magnitude of future earthquakes be predicted reliably and accurately? In their Perspective, Geller et al .'s answer is “no.” Citing recent results from the physics of nonlinear systems “chaos theory,” they argue that any small earthquake has some chance of cascading into a large event. According to research cited by the authors, whether or not this happens depends on unmeasurably fine details of conditions in Earth's interior. Earthquakes are therefore inherently unpredictable. Geller et al . suggest that controversy over prediction lingers because prediction claims are not stated as objectively testable scientific hypotheses, and due to overly optimistic reports in the mass media.
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Citations
Cited by
The Mechanics of Earthquakes and Faulting
Scholz, C. H. (2019) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781316681473 · Cited by 910
Williamson, M. (1999) · Ecography · doi:10.1111/j.1600-0587.1999.tb00449.x · Cited by 367
Earthquake magnitude prediction in Hindukush region using machine learning techniques
Asim, K. M., Martínez-Álvarez, F., Basit, A., & Iqbal, T. (2017) · Natural Hazards · doi:10.1007/s11069-016-2579-3 · Cited by 256
Culture and disaster risk reduction: lessons and opportunities.
Mercer, J., Gaillard, J. C., Crowley, K., Shannon, R., Alexander, B., Day, S., & Becker, J. (2012) · Environmental Hazards · doi:10.1080/17477891.2011.609876 · Cited by 127
Metadata
- Authors
- Geller, R. J., Jackson, D. D., Kagan, Y. Y., & Mulargia, F.
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 1997-03-14
- Volume
- 275
- Issue
- 5306
- Pages
- 1616-1616
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W2106017075
- Cited by
- 815
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 24.86
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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- CoChat. (2026). Citation check: Earthquakes Cannot Be Predicted. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1126/science.275.5306.1616
- The paper
- Geller, R. J., Jackson, D. D., Kagan, Y. Y., & Mulargia, F. (1997). Earthquakes Cannot Be Predicted. Science. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.275.5306.1616
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Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.
Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
