Small Tremors

The current state of geological science cannot predict an earthquake. There is hope, however, that warnings might be realistically developed so that populations in danger of the “big one” can be given some sort of reasonable information about probabilities. In studying the past few devastating quakes, such as the 2011 9.0 that hit Japan twice (once in the shaking, then the epic tsunami) and the 8.2 in April 2014 in the ocean off Chile, scientists were able to record significant data.

Each of those massive seismic events was preceded by foreshocks that were, or we hope they are, distinguishable from other types of instability. Up to this point, earthquake prediction has been totally hit and miss, often left to using precursors like profound changes in animal behavior or the unusual release of gases from the area in question. Now, it is these distinct earthquake swarms, or what some in the discipline are calling the long precursory phase:

We find that there is a remarkable contrast between the foreshock sequences of interplate compared with intraplate earthquakes. Most large earthquakes at plate interfaces in the North Pacific were preceded by accelerating seismic activity in the months to days leading up to the mainshock.

It makes intuitive sense, though in practical use much harder to define. A large earthquake is not a single event; it is a series of shifts and changes that build up to a devastating final act (and then the main quake is not always the last to register). There is a process at work, one that humans don’t fully understand and find great difficulty in measuring and distinguishing.

Financial markets aren’t really much different. Though people have been staring at trading screens for days on end for decades now, and long before that glued steadfastly to the ticker, how much do we really know about markets? Surprisingly little, a condition that may have actually worsened over the past few decades of “don’t fight the Fed” and the explosion in the number of Ivy League mathematicians in every trading house.