cc: file, Grandma Hafen via Tony Hafen, Pauline Nelson via mail, Sara and Des Penny, Claude and Katherine Warner, Lloyd and Luana Warner. and Diane Cluff.
I received the following e-mail from Diane Cluff yesterday morning:
I did a search though the thoughtlets for the word `earthquake' and found I have only used it 4 times in 3+ years of weekly Thoughlets. And to think, earthquake seismology is the basis of my profession. The first reference was scriptural (../9802), the second scientific (../9821), and the other two engineering based (../9847.html).
As I think about the major earthquake news from Turkey a few weeks ago (which possibly killed 30,000 people), followed by a 7.6 magnitude earquake in Taiwan last month (which either destroyed foactories or threw sophisticated machines out of calibration and has resulted in doubling of the cost of RAM memory), to the major earthquake in Mexico a few weeks ago (which along with the floods is creating havoc), to this 7.0 earthquake in the Mojave Desert yesterday (which Diane wrote me about), it is easy to raise the question `are these the signs of the times prophesied about in the scriptures. Particularly Matthew 24:7-8 where it reads:
Earlier this week there were a couple of unrelated articles on earthquakes in the newspaper. Results from the man induced moonquake from slamming a satellite into the moon in the polar region to see if the dust that raised up had water particles was reported. There is no water recorded. The other was from a scientist who predicts a major earthquake in the San Francisco area within the next 30 years. And then the next day there is one at 3:00 in the morning that wakes Diane and Chuck up in Los Angeles. So is it the end of time, as prophisied by the savior and the prophets?
As I have read all of these articles, my mind has jumped back to my days at The University of Utah. My advisor was Dr. Robert (Bob) Smith. He had got his Ph.D. from the U just a few years before, and so he was a colleague of several of the graduate students in the Geophysics Department. He was learning how to teach, and one of the tools he used was to have us read and abstract numerous technical articles, mostly about earthquake seismology. I was convinced he never read any of the articles, and yet having a type A+ personality, I worked to made sure to do every assignment with exactness.
One of the longest publications concerned the tectonic between Santiquin, just south of Spanish Fork, and Ogden. It was Dr. Smiths belief that Mount Nebo represents a mini-triple junction for three small crustal plates, and that along this portion of the Wasatch Front there have been no significant earthquakes historically because the two plates are moving in sync with each other. It was a long and tedious article, with page after page of earthquake seismographs. One of the things I had been graded down on earlier in the quarter (yes we were on quarters back in 1973-74) was not putting my own thoughts into the abstract of the articles. So I recall dutifully summarizing the theories of the article and then I said something like:
It was written tounge in cheek, and based on the marks on the paper I became convinced there was no benefit to my grades to do all of the reading and writing these abstracts required. However, it has been a fun story to repeat, and I still remember this article about the basis of earthquakes, while having long ago forgot all of the others Dr. smith had us read.
Another thing I remember was a series of discussion groups we had about earthquakes. Having served a mission, I was one of the more fluent talkers, and I ended up heading up a group about the social responsibilities of earthquake seismologists. We did various scenarios, and described how we would interact with the public. It is a hard question, mostly because the frequency of earthquakes is so far out of sync with the frequency of daily living. Also because if you are too alarmist, then the public turns off, and doesn't have Relief Society Meetings making earthquake preparedness kits. And too many folks don't believe the things earth scientists predict. For example, the Salt Lake Valley is covered with a layer of clay, which if it is shaken by an earthquake acts like a liquid. The clay is thickest under the Salt Lake airport. When there is a major earthquake in Salt Lake, the airport runways will buckle, the freeways will buckle, and standard forms of transportation will become close to useless. Unlike Y2K, I believe this is a serious problem, which you kids will see people experience during your lifetime. Not necessarily in the Wasatch Front Valleys, but somewhere. It just makes sense that as populations escalate, and as there are more populations in places like Los Angeles, San Francisco, the Wasatch/Hurricane/Mexico City fault trend, Taipei, Istanbul, etc. that there will be more cultural disasters like we have seen the last few weeks.
So am I answering my question about the end of time? No, we each get to answer that question for ourselves. We each need to be satisfied with our personal relationship with our maker. Then it doesn't matter when the end of time comes. As a scientist, I do not statistically see any more earthquakes than have happened across the history of the geological record. We hear more about the earthquakes that occur because telecommunications technologies are so much better, because there are more people living in dangerous places, because our methodologies for measuring and monitoring are much better than they have ever been before, and because the news papers need something to print. I'm not sure this constitutes the beginning of sorrows. And if it does, I'm OK with it because I know God lives, I know he cares about me personally, I know my Savior has suffered for my mistakes, and I know that if I simply have faith, repent, and take care of required ordinances, that the Holy Ghost will guide me, and I will return home to that God which gave me life. And you kids will have the same blessing.
The key is to keep living our lives the best we can, and try to make the world a better place for everyone within our sphere of influence. Maybe that is why I bore those who take time to read all of these words I write about what I do each week. Monday I had meetings with an operations man assigned to Ameriven in Venezuela. I worked until 6:00, and Andrea, Rachel, and Matt picked me up and we went to see the IMAX movie "Treasures of Egypt" for Family Home Evening. Tuesday Richard Nehring came down from Colorado Springs and we had a meeting, where I sat up for him to form a new consortium at HARC. I worked late and went straight to the soccer fields to pick up Matt from practice since Andrea was at Relief Society. Wednesday morning we had 40 Aldine High School students in the theater and we introduced them to Immersive Environments. It was fun. I left work in time to make it to Young Men's. We played tennis again this week. Thursday's sales forecast was much better than any we have had before. I left the teleconference feeling like maybe Continuum is going to make it. I had a GSH Board Meeting at 10:30, which I was a half hour early for. In the afternoon Matt, Andrea, and I went to a counselor to talk about his grades and what is behind how he is doing. We ate at McDonalds, and I stayed at work until about 11:00. Friday I went in early and got home about 12:00 in the evening. My seminar is coming together pretty good, and baring a major earthquake I'm optimistic it will come together.
Yesterday morning, after reading the early morning e-mail from Diane about the California earthquake, I put together some web pages for Nate which have his e-mail's about his Mom's reoccurance of cancer (http://www.walden3d.com/nate). We took Matt to his soccer game. They did really good. For the first time the team made 2 points, there were no substitutes, and everyone played good and hard. Still lost 4 to 2, and yet everyone felt better about how they had done. After a quick lunch, Rob drove me back to work and he kept the Lexus for his Homecoming date. I worked until Andrea picked me up at 8:00. We went to a house concert by a guitarist named Doug at Peter Duncan's house. It was a nice evening. I expect you will hear more about this guy over the coming years, and I might even host him on my web site. Church was good today. Rob, thanks for coming over to eat lunch with us, and thanks for spending time with Matt. I think there is plenty of support for each one of us, if we will just share what our needs are, and if we will not be too proud to accept some help when we need it. It is not necessary for there to be a major disaster for us to need a little help. I hope, over the next few years, these Thoughtlets become more of a medium for how we can provide real and beneficial service to each other and to others, even if they are not in the middle of a major earthquake."