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Editorial

Nature Geoscience 1, 803 (1 December 2008) | doi:10.1038/ngeo368

Globalizing quake information

The devastation wreaked by large earthquakes is a stark reminder of how small and vulnerable human beings are when confronted with the forces of nature. The regularity with which the world has been surprised by these forces during the most recent past would seem to vindicate the famous remark by the Pulitzer-prize-winning historian Will Durant: “civilization exists by geologic consent, subject to change without notice”.