labadimp t1_j7t2g8r wrote
Reply to comment by CrustalTrudger in Can the static tension of tectonic plates be quantified, or how are predictions about future quakes made? by TokinGeneiOS
Sounds like you know your stuff. Awesome post. I am curious, does this mean that you could give a risk assesment to certain areas? If so, where do you think the next bif earthquake will be? I know that generally contradicts exactly what you just said, but pretend you have to choose somewhere. Where would it be?
CrustalTrudger t1_j7u01sw wrote
Yeah, so, this is completely antithetical to everything I just laid out. I.e., you're effectively asking for a prediction after I just spent a significant amount of time trying to explain why these are not possible. PSHA maps for a given region are going to be the best bet for effectively background risk. As new events occur, these of course are updated as we consider whether a large event has increased or decreased risk in a certain place (e.g., through loading or unloading of related faults through Coulomb stress transfer, etc.) and as we learn more about an area (i.e., expanded paleoseismology records, faults are discovered through mapping, etc). Similarly, there will be specific short duration forecasts related to individual large earthquakes, i.e., aftershock forecasts. Beyond that, even within the area of the world I specifically focus on (and for which I understand the local geology and earthquake hazards reasonably well), there is no meaningful way for me, or anyone else, to make statements like what you're asking for. Anyone who does is either irresponsible or trying to sell you something.
As a relevant aside, for anyone musing on the potential benefits of true earthquake prediction in the sense outlined in my earlier answer (and sidestepping all of the reasons why we don't generally think it's possible), I would highly recommend this opinion piece by Dave Petley (a geologist who works on quantifying natural hazards). The general thesis is that basically, unless predictions (as defined above) are 100% accurate (which they never could be, even in the rosiest view of our future capabilities), they are unlikely to improve outcomes anymore than forecasts (as defined above) and would likely actually have significant negative outcomes potentially making "predictions" worse than "forecasts", i.e., the risks associated with either false negatives or false positives are very large both in an economic and human life sense.
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