Scientists Convicted For Not Predicting an Earthquake

From memory, the translation I saw at the beginning of this fiasco was that they told the people that the tremors didn't mean that there would be an earthquake but they did not emphasize that it could occur. People, the authorities claim they didn't act because of the assurance that no major earthquake would happen.

It is still ridiculous, but it does offer a reason for the verdict.

Of course, engineers and scientists are not so respected here that people believe their prognostications so we shouldn't have this trouble.

If they predict one, and it doesn't come, they will be convicted of fraud, and sued for creating an unnecessary panic.

Gee, why doesn't anyone want to get into engineering or science?

Keep on topic. And Refrain from writing things that could be appropriate to some people.

That's why I always thought I'd take up meteorology someday. They expect you to be wrong half the time.

Yes, that's a marvelous job ! and when they fail, all they have to do is explain why didn't it happen what they said yesterday.

Maybe not a good idea now. A golfer that gets stuck by lighting can find fault in your miss prediction of the weather.

Appears Italy has no use for science or scientist. There is another case where one of these scientist in the past had made a prediction. The official that order the evacuation was held accountable because the earthquake didn't happen.

All this to make the people feel good. To scientist that have many times said that there is way to truely predict an earthquake.

Does Italy allow bills of attainder against the prosecutor and judge? If so, they should be enacted promptly.

Do it like the weather report.

There is a 20% chance of a major earthquake today.

That is the base line. Adjust upwards as needed.

Sounds like a witch trial.

It sets a bad precedent. If scientists are going to be held personally accountable for natural disasters, it could apply to anything. Hurricanes, volcanos, floods, droughts...............................

Precedent is right.

It can run away through out. A farmer lays down 20 acres of hay after listening to the weather of clear sky's for the rest of the week, only to have it, rain just prior to baling.

Your pizza you had delivered that they said would be their 30-45 minutes arrives an hour later.........

Your monthly government entitlement check arriving 1 day late...........

It was already ridicules, now its not even funny. It diffidently put a stigma not only on science, but with a lack of a better word,..... common sense.

Just wait for the movie: " The vulcanologist of Blair".

Witch trial........... When ever I hear someone that says that, I always think of Monty Python's "Search for the Holy Grail"

It was a quest . . ..

Wood floats and really small rocks too.

But, maybe it was more like the Spanish Italian Inquisition. She's made of tougher stuff. Put her in the comfy chair !!!!

I might have to rethink this. If the scientists made public announcements, telling people that they had nothing to worry about..............

Scientists should always err on the side of caution, where the public is concerned.

http://www.surenews.com/bizarre/italy-goes-insane-jails-scientists-for-not-predicting-earthquake.htm

It was of interest to note in that clip........that the trial was carried out in a makeshift tribunal.

Me thinks........same, same kangaroo court!!

A kangaroo court is "a mock court in which the principles of law and justice are disregarded or perverted". (Wiki)

Somehow I think that there won't be any more scientific advisory panels in Italy. If there are, I would imagine that every single event will be called a precursor to disaster. They'd be stupid to say otherwise.

http://rt.com/news/italy-jail-scientists-reaction-061/

Should Sipkin be jailed too?

http://www.livescience.com/3451-complex-geology-italian-earthquake.html

Looks to me like government covering their butts.

http://world.time.com/2012/10/24/the-aquila-earthquake-verdict-where-the-guilt-may-really-lie/?xid=rss-topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+time%2Ftopstories+%28TIME%3A+Top+Stories%29

I heard that on the radio yesterday, and it is totally Ridicules, the idea that is.

What to they think the out come of this is going to be?

I can see the answers we'll get from the scientists.

Official: Professor, we have tremors in the southeast, is that an indication of an pending earthquake.

Professor: Maybe.........

I remember not so long ago but oh so long ago when I was pulled aside by an upper management "leader' who said; "Be careful what you say. Remember, the run of mill people don't know or understand what is going on here. They all think you know what you are talking about so they beleive everything you say. Make sure you do not allude to anything that you are not absolutely sure of."

Somehow we have arrived at the point in time where the "experts" are more than willing to take the money for doing a job and/or voicing an opinion but are not willing to accept the responsibilty or liability for making or as in this case "not making" the right decision.

The general attitude of; "I can say anything I want to. I have the right to speak my mind. After all it's just my opinion." is creating a fairytale world where many decisions that affect the world population and economy have been based strictly on the opinion of scientists, engineers, or a mixed group of the two and not the scientific method of "measure, measure, measure then validate, validate, validate before making/giving a statement as being fact."

Too many times the general population has been told by the media that they have been duped by erroneous, prejudiced, flawed opinion from the scientific/engineering sect so they are now starting to overreact when something goes wrong.

I sympathize with the scientists and their families.

I hope for common sense to prevail so that people realize we are all just human and find forgiveness in their hearts.

While we have come a long way in technology, we still cannot in any way control or predict "mother nature" nor any other facet of the laws of physics with 100% accuracy (yet).

One day we may be able to do so, but that day has not yet come to pass and everyone including the educated "experts" need to remember; "Be careful of what you say or do not say because those arround you think you know what you are talking about."

You are right.

Fact of the matter is, a person even if they are wrong, will be believed if that person displays the stronger belief system.

Ever leave an argument thinking the person you argued convinced you he was right and you later find out that you were right. That's what I mean.

You step up and act like an authority and people will follow.

On a side note, I just want to cover my butt...There might be an earthquake so be prepared.

They did an experiment on an elevator over 20 -35 30 years ago.

When people entered the elevator it was rather normal, until a person that looked to be in upper management. Suit and tie..... well dressed and carries himself with a leader type demeanor

When people entered the elevator, a hierarchy formed and took place, where the subordinates gave way to the upper management and preceded to look down in a submissive manner while upper management showed confidence and looked up at the floor level.

One tend to think if there is some sort of 'power struggle' going on, similar to what hap pend in the dark ages.

Imagine what the world would be like today if you walked into a kingdom, when firearms were first being introduced and suggesting to the king about focusing research and development into making a repeating rifle. Telling him the importance of making it breech loading and rifling the barrel as well. Suggesting the types of professionals that might be useful, such as an expert in metals, a watch maker or someone skilled in making small mechanical devices and a chemist.

Not hard to imagine what would happen.

A guy by the name of Galileo Galilei tried something similar once.

I think the scale of creating a more efficient weapon would pass through unobserved compared to someone's challenging The Vatican's views of planetary rotations.

I enjoyed reading that. Thank you for the link.

All for the name of science. I respect that.

Now if we could only get the politicians to be held liable for what they said they would do but didn't or for what they said the wouldn't do but did just the same.

..... there could be something positive that comes out o this......

We had postings on this same topic about a year ago http://cr4.globalspec.com/thread/72290.

Sometimes I need to double check that the year is really 2012 and not 1712.

Just in case anyone is checking it is probably best not to voice an opinion on that earth is flat vs. earth is round issue. Also, don't rule out the possibility that the sun might orbit around the earth.

What? The earth is round. Why didn't somebody tell me of this?

Good thing Werner Heisenberg wasn't Italian or we might have The Certainty Principle.

No worries about these guys, though, by the time they get round to sentencing, Italy will have yet another government.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch (such as it is), Texas jails honor students for missing too much school. That's right. This particular girl works two jobs to support her siblings AND attends school when she's old enough to drop out AND earns top grades in spite of it all. TexArse' response? Where the community could be helping the student to make ends meet, they toss her in jail instead.

More news from Neanderthal Country: Students in Texas to be monitored with Microchips. Wonderful place. I suppose that once they iron-out the wrinkles, they'll require everyone to be monitored likewise. You know, for our own good?

If you believe that, then you also believe in the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, Honest Lawyers and Leaders Who Have Our Best Interests at Heart.

Right. Welcome to the Prison State, Where Incarceration is King.

Amazing that America somehow managed to become a great country without all this. You can bet that if the Founding Fathers were here today, they'd be locked up indefinitely on suspicion of terror, renditioned to some rat-infested third-world prison cell (where our anti-torture laws conveniently don't apply; the whole point of it all), out of the public eye (where they can do whatever they please and no-one's the wiser) and without any hope of legal recourse (in complete violation of America's Constitution, which our President has sworn to uphold). America's Founding Fathers, were they alive today, would be considered criminals, and if that's what they'd think of America's Founding Fathers, what do they think of us.

This isn't their doing. Where the Government is by the People, there is no 'their.' They is us. That is, unless there is no longer a Government by the People; and if there isn't, we're screwed.

I have seen a lot of good Italian engineering in my time but when it comes to the law I must say that I have not seen this level of stupidity applied ever by a country that has produced some quality assets to this planet. There will have to be a Darwin Award for some of these people

What I know of Italy is that they have some peculiar laws, especially when it comes to liability. But thats just an outsiders opinion.

I think that it would be great since it would establish a Precedent that could be used to try ALL the Italian Politicians who allowed their Economy to become so debt ridden that it is on the verge of collapse. The fact that whomever was in office didn't predict the Economic Cliff that their economy was going to face could now be jailed, tried and obviously convicted based on this Precedent. I wonder if they could try Judges for allowing Criminals to go free based on some technicality if that criminal killed someone during the time span they should have been in jail?

I remember Frank Field, the Weatherman, predicting "Partly Cloudy" for the next day. We had 12 inches of "Partly Cloudy" on my driveway and the roads the next morning. So anyone who had an accident should be able to collect for the damages under this Precedent.

It's not that much of a reach before we have Saddam Hussien's killing his weather forecasters when they botched the job. Thing is, absolutely accurate weather forecasting is impossible, even in principle. This is because weather systems are chaotic in nature.

During the 1960's Dr. Edward Lorenz was a meteorologist at MIT working on a project to simulate weather patterns on a computer. He accidentally stumbled upon what is now called the Butterfly Effect after deviations in calculations off by thousandths greatly changed the simulations. The Butterfly Effect reflects how changes on small scales affect things at much, much larger scales. It is the classic example of chaos, as small changes lead to large changes later on. An example of this is how a butterfly's flapping its wings in Hong Kong could change tornado patterns in Texas six months later. In order to know enough to make accurate weather predictions, we'd have to instrument every cubic centimetre of the planet's atmosphere and it still wouldn't be enough information. Moreover, the instrumentation itself, merely by being present, would change weather patterns to such an extent that the whole costly exercise would be completely futile. We would still not have enough information, because the system itself is intrinsically chaotic. This knowledge was also available to Saddam Hussein. Those men were killed for nothing.

If your weatherman botches things, don't hold him in contempt. He's working in near-complete darkness, by definition.

In other news of the chaos-related professions, new laws are in the works to punish Romanian witches if their predictions are incorrect.

http://news.sky.com/story/836078/fortune-tellng-witches-face-spells-in-jail

I predict an impending shortage of meteorologists and seismologists in the same region...

The astral advice for unemployed seismologists on this date is, "Relax, stay home, and have a glass of wine."

And for tomorrow's date, "Consider a move to Alexandria, Louisiana, where it has been deemed impossible to predict the future, but by Federal court decision, still permissible to do so."

http://freethoughtblogs.com/dispatches/2012/07/18/ordinance-against-fortune-telling-overturned/

For some reason I had always believed that Weather Forecasters exist to make Astrologers look respectable.

But of course... and now, seismologists as well.

If these guys were sitting around the pub, and said that there was nothing to worry about, it would be one thing.

Here's my theory: These guys made the announcement, under pressure from the Italian government, in order to keep everyone calm.

Since governments never, ever admit to being wrong, someone has to be scapegoated.

It's probably a government screw up, but now they've cleared themselves, and are busy doing the work of the people, and making sure that nothing like this happens again.

And the Italians do it AGAIN! Law trumps science...

Italians are starting to pi@@ me off.

Do that have a law about that yet?

Sadly the real message is don't trust politicians as they will throw you under the bus to protect themselves rather than take responsibility. This is just one example of many and is not just the Italian politicians.

"We made a mistake but you didn't correct us in time so it's totally your fault not ours".

A good reminder however to always be careful with any advice given (or misquoted in this case) that could come back and bite your professional asses. Mind you, less than a day assuming the scientists were actually reviewing the press release is less time than you get in many fast-paced Hollywood disaster movies.

The movie Dante's Peak is on (ITV in the UK).

Anyone else seen it? Pertinent.

Ok - watched it. Lots of crap. But still a bit pertinent.

So the volcanologist will be replaced by priests? They can always say it is a punishment from god!