Alright, theres been a back and forth arguement in the thread
www.abovetopsecret.com...
There seems to be a few misconceptions, which even myself may have inadvertently fueled in the thread.
Downtown463 posted the following link:
www.thehorizonproject.com...
I summarized it shortly after with the following:
No no, population has nothing to do with this chart. The populatiuon today and the population in 1990 has not changed by that much. It seems from
1900-1995, there was at most 5-6 major earthquakes a year. Remember this chart only graphs magnitude 6-8, earthquakes.
Why is it, that the only anomaly on the graph comes in the last 10 years, where for practically every year in that last decade, the amount of quakes
is many times more of the average year for the previous century?
1998: 7
1999: 13 quakes
2000: 6 quakes
2001: 7 quakes
2002: 22 (4 times average)
2003: 38 (almost 8 times average)
2004: 33 (6+ times everage)
2005: 36 (7 times average)
2006: 24 (4 times average)
Between 1900-1997, the highest year of major quakes brought a total of 6, this was in years '35, '57, '75, '76.
Not once in the last 10 years, has the amount of major earthquakes been less than, the highest recorded amount from 1900-1997.
Food for thought eh.
Now, as the thread progressed a reoccurring theme of blaming it on greater communication and ability to detect. At first, I was skeptical cause the
increase seemed far to drastic.
Worth noting, the most mis-leading part of the graph is that it makes it appear as if it is showing ALL the earthquakes, this is not true, the graph
was derived from
earthquake.usgs.gov...
That page lists the earthquakes that make up the graph but states the following as its criteria:
"Selected earthquakes of general historic interest.
All earthquake dates are UTC, not local time. "
Well what deems something of historic interest? I am not sure, and even considering casualities that doesn't really seem to reflect exactly why those
quakes are chosen, especially since casualties in these quakes range from a hand full (or none reported at all) to thousands.
So I am now a firm believer that this is no longer a phenomenon we are experiencing - a period of heightened earthquake activity, rather we are
placing more 'historical importance' on the quakes.
In 1900-1950 (or so) population ranged between 1.5 - 2.5 billion. Today our population is 4+ times what it was in 1900, and 2.5 times what it was in
1950. So as population and communication increase, there is no doubt we will see more earthquakes being deemed 'historically significant'.
I didn't stop there, to further illustrate the point, I looked at the raw data of the USGS for the years of 1990-1999, and then 2000-2008. Comparing
the numbers to see if we were getting more frequent earthquakes.
Now, I understand that a comparision of even earlier numbers would be more ideal, but I feel the comparison of those two decades is still of
importance since the original chart showed a large increase in quakes starting in 1999.
Since ATS loves charts, I made one.
I feel its now clear that there is no conspiracy which conclusively shows that we are experiencing more earthquakes world wide today, than humans were
experiencing 100 years ago. Though it is hard to definitively make that statement, I think that the evidence so far shows that, that is the case.
[edit on 4-12-2008 by king9072]
