Seismology is the scientific study of earthquakes and of the generation and propagation of elastic waves through planetary bodies. Robert Mallet, who coined the term seismology itself, laid the foundations of the discipline from 1857, carrying out seismological experiments using explosives to study how shock waves travel through the ground. The discipline became a genuinely instrumental science through John Milne, who invented the horizontal pendulum seismograph in 1880 while teaching in Japan, co-founded the Seismological Society of Japan, and went on to build a global network of about forty earthquake observatories equipped with his instrument; for two decades his own observatory in England served as the world headquarters for earthquake seismology.
Facts
Founded YearSourced to the subject's own account Central QuestionSourced to the subject's own accountCan the time, location and magnitude of a future earthquake ever be reliably predicted, given that decades of research have established only longer-run probabilities rather than short-term forecasts? 2 ScopeSourced to the subject's own accountSeismology is the scientific study of earthquakes and the propagation of elastic waves through the Earth, used both to understand the planet's interior and to assess earthquake hazard. 2 SignificanceSourced to the subject's own accountJohn Milne, an English geologist working in Japan in the 1880s, invented a practical horizontal pendulum seismograph and helped found the Seismological Society of Japan, work that earned him recognition as the father of modern seismology. 2 Connections
Founded By
Invented the horizontal pendulum seismograph (1880) and built the first global earthquake observatory network.
Source Seismology (Wikipedia)
Additional Source John Milne (Wikipedia)Career in England section
Has Scientist
Source Charles Richter (Wikipedia)
Has Theory
Open Questions
Source Seismology (Wikipedia)
Uses
Seismograph, Instruments The seismograph is seismology's own primary recording instrument; this edge was unreachable before the seismology discipline entity existed.
Source Seismology (Wikipedia)
Sources
1. John Milne (Wikipedia)
WikipediaCareer in Japan section
John Milne is generally credited with the invention of the horizontal pendulum seismograph in 1880.
Founded By: John Milne, Career in England section
For the next 20 years, Milne's seismological observatory was the world headquarters for earthquake seismology.
View the Source 2. Seismology (Wikipedia)
WikipediaHistory, Beginnings of Modern Science section
From 1857, Robert Mallet laid the foundation of modern instrumental seismology and carried out seismological experiments using explosives.
- Uses: Seismograph
- Founded By: John Milne
View the Source What Is Geophysics? (EarthScope Consortium)
EarthScope ConsortiumPart Of: Geophysics, What is geophysics? pageQuote, Part Of: Geophysics, What is geophysics? page
This means that geophysics is a broad field with many applications and subdisciplines. Two large disciplines with long histories are seismology and geodesy.
Charles Richter (Wikipedia)
WikipediaHas Scientist: Charles Richter, IntroductionQuote, Has Scientist: Charles Richter, Introduction
April 26, 1900, September 30, 1985) was an American seismologist and physicist. He is one of the creators of the Richter scale, which, until the development of the moment magnitude scale in 1979, was widely used to quantify the size of earthquakes.
Open Questions (1 open question)
Can earthquakes be reliably predicted?
Decades of seismological research have established longer-run probabilistic hazard estimates for a given region, but no method has reliably forecast the precise time, location and magnitude of an individual future earthquake, and some researchers argue short-term prediction may be fundamentally impossible given how earthquakes nucleate.
What would resolve this A precursor signal, whether seismic, geochemical or geodetic, shown across many independent earthquakes to reliably precede rupture with enough lead time and specificity to issue an actionable short-term warning.
Seismology and geophysicsSeismology (Wikipedia)
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