Talk:Volcanology

Restructuring of Volcano articles

I have restructured many of the articles on Volcanoes. I moved information around, restructuring as I thought appropriate. Here are the pages I changed or created: Volcano, Volcanology, History of Volcanology, and Volcano Prediction. I DID NOT DELETE ANYTHING. I simply moved things around to reduce page size. All content is still there, just some sections are in different pages. Heavy Metal Cellist ^talk_contribs

p.s. Some of the content in this talk page may now be obsolete. Heavy Metal Cellist ^talk_contribs

Modern Volcanology?

Wow if you're interested in Volcanology up to 1600 AD, this is the page for you!

Vulcanology redirect to volcano

Moved from Wikipedia:Village pump.

Should Vulcanology just be a redirect to volcano? If so, change it. LittleDan

I don't think it should. I'm sure there are interesting things to say about vulcanology; if we leave the page, someone will probably flesh it out one day. Followup to Talk:Vulcanology. -- Merphant 02:31 1 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Vulcanology and Vulcanologist merged

I will merge vulcanology and vulcanologist. That should improve the content. Emperorbma 08:36 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Merge complete. Final step, remove from stub list. Emperorbma 08:41 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

SPECIAL NOTE: All the old backups for Vulcanologist were NOT transferred. This was a merge. Emperorbma

Relevant contributions to Vulcanologist: (Saved for posterity)

• 03:39 2 Jul 2003 . . Emperorbma (Step 2: Redirect to Vulcanology.)
• M 03:33 2 Jul 2003 . . Emperorbma
• M 03:32 2 Jul 2003 . . Emperorbma
• M 03:29 2 Jul 2003 . . Emperorbma
• M 01:02 2 Jul 2003 . . Seav (copyedit)
• 01:01 2 Jul 2003 . . Seav (stubbly (I'm surprised there's no article yet!))

UPDATE: Subsequently moved to Volcanology. Emperorbma

Spelling

I think that Volcanology is the more "popular" spelling than Vulcanology. Google says:

Volcanology     43,600 results 
Vulcanology      4,090 results

Volcanologist    9,240 results
Vulcanologist    1,440 results

Looking at the results, it seems that Volcanology is used in the US, Canada, NZ, some UK, some Australia, Germany. Vulcanology is used in the UK, France, Australia, Italy, Canada. —seav 11:35 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Mea culpa... I noticed that, but I had already set Volcanology, Volcanologist and Vulcanologist to redirect here by then. Anyway, no one should miss this article, since it covers both spellings. Emperorbma 19:27 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

It's easy to change it all back. There was a time somebody changed all the links to Manila, Philippines to point to Manila and there were about 150 of them. There is only about 15 vo/vulcanology references. So do we move to 'o'? —seav 03:17 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)

If we do change them we will have to move this page to Volcanology and then change all the references, and since there is currently a redirect at Volcanology, we might have issues. Emperorbma 05:18 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Apparently the person who wrote the redirect page can overwrite it. OK, I've done as you suggested. Emperorbma

Thanks for moving it! Now, if I can only find someone who will improve the stub. :) —seav 06:54 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Predicting Eruptions

Disagree that volcanic eruptions are unpredictable. There are too many instances of accurate predictions for this old saw to keep popping up.

Agree that many eruptions have not been predicted - but that was always a lack of monitoring and/or understanding of the plumbing.

For documentation of accurate predictions see publications for eruptions at St. Helens, St. Augustine, Pinataubo, Mayon, Spur, Vesuvius, etc.

Next, volcanology is not particularly dangerous for those who pay attention to the available monitoring data. Agree that there have been some spectacular losses, but many fewer than amongst those looking for oil and gold.

Regards ngs@teleport.com

I disagree strongly with your assertion that there are accurate predictions of volcanic eruptions. Volcanologists are actually very careful to specify that they are forecasting, not predicting, eruptions. No volcanologist would say, "This volcano will erupt next Tuesday at 4", which would be a prediction. They would say, "This volcano has a high probability of erupting in the next week", which would be a forecast.

In that, volcanology is a lot like meteorology - it deals in forecasts and probabilities, not absolutes. This issue is an "old saw" only because people seem to think that volcanologists are capable of predicting an eruption. They're not; they can only make very good guesses based on the best data available from their instrumentation. Those guesses improve as the technology and monitoring methods do, but they aren't absolutes, which is what a prediction entails.

I'm curious, as a geologist and a volcanologist, to know what publications you're talking about. St. Helens, for example, was obviously going to erupt soon, but had the scientists there been able to "accurately predict" the eruption, David Johnston would not have been killed. Vesuvius last erupted in 1944, when volcanology was in its infancy and scientists didn't have half the techniques they do now - and certainly no one "predicted" the 79 AD eruption, when thousands of people died in Pompeii and Herculaneum.

Volcanology can also be very dangerous even if you pay attention to the monitoring data. Just because a volcano is quiet one day doesn't mean it won't erupt the next, with or without warning. We don't know a lot about the plumbing of most volcanoes, and even if we do that doesn't mean we understand how they produce eruptions. Volcanologists also face danger from hazardous gases, earthquakes, mudflows, landslides, silicosis from ash, burns from hot material, broken bones and dehydration and sunburn from fieldwork... Lots of volcanologists suffer injuries in their line of work, but only the most grievous losses are publicized enough for non-geologists to hear about them.

Farristry (talk) 20:20, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Stub and catagory

I have made this a Geology stub. This raises the question as to whether Volcanology should be a catagory or just a subcatagory of geology. Commnets anyone?

--NHSavage 15:08, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

Don't know if there's any need to decategorise it...we just need to add to it. I can do that thanks to a fairly nifty book I happen to have, which goes into the history of the science. Anyway...later on.Rolinator 08:16, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Rock

I know next to nothing about geology, but this part of the edge of the crater of Volcán Irazú, Costa Rica looks like a fault to me, something that is caused by the distortion of old rocks. But shouldn't a volcanic crater have all 'fresh', 'unfolded' rock? I don't know where to put this image, so I'll leave that to the experts. (Let's see where flattery gets me:) ). DirkvdM 12:31, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Looks like an unconformity, a more recent lava flow on top of older material. The tilting - craters result from the collapse of a volcanic core which creates considerable local faulting and distortion, so folded or tilted and distorted lava layers are to be expected around a caldera collapse. Vsmith 13:12, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Merge from History of Volcanology

The entire content of History of Volcanology has been merged into Volcanology, and that page is now a redirect. There is no need for a separate article yet, and this article is vastly improved by including that content directly within it. This article was just a stub otherwise. --Seattle Skier (See talk tierS) 00:59, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Mythical History of Volcanology

That section reads like it was written by a four year old. I have no idea what it's talking about. Valcanoes I guess.. --unsigned

The christian section is not that neutral "miraculously" and "clove" sounds like it's taken from an f'in sermon. M4bwav 19:01, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Archaeologists now believe that the Catalhoyuk painting doesn't represent an erupting volcano; this interpretation dates from 1964 and further work at the site has pretty much disproven this interpretation. I have 3 scholarly articles to footnote this, and plan to change this paragraph in a few days, but am open to discussion before doing so. Sm255 (talk) 13:00, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Also, the jpg that purports to be the Anatolian Museum of Civilizations wall painting, is a distorted and inaccurate copy of the original. The person who added it says he made it himself - certainly posting any actual reproduction of the painting would violate copyright - but we should not let this inaccurate graphic remain here. Sm255 (talk) 13:11, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Tools and techniques of volcanology

An anon editor using an Indiana University IP recently added content to this section. The user gave Harvard style references (name and date), but did not finish with full references in a reference section. I have made an attempt to fill out the missing refs with a bit of googling and searching on Amazon. Hopefully I haven't messed 'em up too badly :-) and perhaps the anon will return and correct any errors I have made. Vsmith 01:07, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

volcanologist

(is a person who studies volcanic activity) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.6.80.134 (talk) 23:18, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Current revert

WMC, the study you try to ignore is an actual study about the current developememnts in the field, no reason at all to delete it. If you have points about improvement, feel welcome to do so. WMC better stop hounding, and avoid being a even more giant You-know-what. "Social studies of volcanology: knowledge generation and expert advice on active volcanoes" is an actual study, even peer reveiwed and has been published in the Bulletin of Volcanology" and the scholars behind it are geographers and volcanologists at the University of Cambridge, those guys that beat Oxford at boat races regularly, (sorry @Yngvadottir:). Serten II (talk) 16:20, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

You really cannot begin a section about "Recent developements" with sociology ("Donovan et al. (2012) used a interdisciplinary approach for social studies of volcanology..."). I really do wonder if you're just trolling. Alternatively, if you're only interested in sociology, stick to just editing sociology.

and avoid being a even more giant You-know-what - this is deliberate incivility on your part. Don't be a dick William M. Connolley (talk) 17:20, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

This is about Vulcanology and written by Vulcanologists. The fact that they use STS methods is a acknoledgement of the STS method. Youre hounding and youre disrupting the improvement of an focal article in earth science. Serten II (talk) 17:28, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

I've been looking into this - there is a small overlap between social science and volcanology, but I don't think that justifies a section of this article as it stands. Mikenorton (talk) 17:39, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

As said, thats about Volcanology and written by Volcanologists and describes current developments in the core of the science. Propose a section that fits your concept, but I do not agree with a complete revert. Serten II (talk) 17:42, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

You do the same thing all over the place. Dump in a section about sociology, get reverted, ignore WP:BRD and instead use your own policy of WP:BRR, protest vociferously that your way is the only way possible, and eventually give up when other people revert you too. Can't you try learning? William M. Connolley (talk) 18:05, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

What you call trolling, is imhon expansion of WP with schorlaly studies. I never had any problem discussion or modyfying edits. Its as well worth while to see where some topics or contents fit and where not. You idea of WP:BRR is hounding around, reverting, offending me personally and claiming "as always I (WMC)knew better". I haven't seen anything constructive yet. Why don't you start behaving along WP:Civil? Serten II (talk) 21:05, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

After seeing the addition, I did some fixing while thinking about it. The section written and focused on a single study seemed a bit off track - starting with "Donovan et al. (2012) used..." struck me as rather poor for an encyclopedia article and that combined with the rather persistent pov pushing by the editor involved ... Anyway, a section entitled "Recent developments" regarding modern volcanology would be good, but not with that kind of pov focus. There certainly exists plenty of recent developments in volcanology that could be used to populate such a section. Vsmith (talk) 18:24, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Point is, the article has been tagged since 2012 and has not seen any improvement. Some of the previous content was rather 19th century without any sourcing. Volcanology was quite important for Humboldtian Science, that could be expanded still, but I missed the current developements, and I was happy to found something. The Donovan et al source is from published in Bulletin of Volcanology, THE peer reviewed journal of the field, by Cambridge University earth scientists, about Volcanologists and their opinions of important incidents and developments in their field and about current Volcanology as a science. I would be happy to have something similar, but the paper is a unique source for this article and of cause e.g. for the Montserrat outbreak as such. If you know anything similar about "Current developements in volcanology, add or suggest it. Serten II (talk) 21:05, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

And with access to the Bulletin of Volcanology, of all the recent articles you pick this one. Why this article? Well that would be quite obvious. And I see you've added essentially the same content to Montserrat Volcano Observatory complete with the black swan bit. Vsmith (talk) 00:02, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Please explain "obvious" I looked for a paper dealing about recent trends in modern volcanology and I found it. If online availability is a problem, send me a mail and you get a complete pdf. WP asks to expand articles, right? The Black Swan bit is rightful in einther case. Quote The eruption on Montserrat was a ‗Black Swan‘ (Taleb 2007) as far as the Montserratian public was concerned, and it transformed the relationship between citizens and science. I did not use the take on Bruno Latour, to avoid WMC going amok but I could provide verbal proof of each of my statements. Reviewers: Chris Newhall volcanology group leader at Earth Observatory of Singapore and Augusto Neri, director or the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia in Pisa. Serten II (talk) 01:11, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Sorry: obvious per your interest/promotion? of social science bits here and there, which seems to cause conflict. As to the "black swan" bit, I had never heard of the usage and had to click the link to get some clue as to what was meant (i.e. unfamiliar jargon). I did learn the jargon by clicking the link, but can it not be stated without the new (2007 coinage) jargon? As for your reference above to Bruno Latour and "amok" ?? I'm clueless with no link to click. Vsmith (talk) 03:10, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Sorry for the lingo, its a sort of challenge (and I am no native English) to use recent research for a WP article, I will work on the wording and invite you to do so as well. The study applies rather new concepts, which may have to be explained instead of being linked to. The Latour remark refers to WMC apparent believe that Holberg Prize laureate Bruno Latour is insane and not allowed as a reliable source. The Donovan study has applied, among others, Latours approaches in Science in action and laboratory life on volcanologists and their fieldwork. I am interested in Science and technology studies and use actual and recent papers to write and expand various articles. Btw the Donovan paper summarizes the (different) views of a large amount of volcanologists active in the field. Therefore it is much more suitable for WP than any single voice. No "piece of sociology" at all.

Serten II (talk) 19:15, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

I added some entries imho relevant for the article.

• 1994/31. International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction Yokohama strategy would need a separate entry, but the decade lead to major volcanology related research programs
• International Association of Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth's Interior contribution to the International decade
• The Global Assessment of Risk (GAR) report is a biennial review and analysis of natural hazards published by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR). The report implements the UN Hyogo Framework for Action
• Donovan has contributed as well a larger chapter in "Extreme Natural Hazards, Disaster Risks and Societal Implications, Zadeh et al Cambridge University Press, 17.04.2014". The entry provides an assessment of the global risk of volcanoes and Donovan appeals to found a worldwide volcanological organization comparable to the WMO.
• Summary of recent volcanology projects Sue Loughlin, British Geological Survey
• A science & arts sensitization program in Chapultenango, 25?years after the 1982 El Chich?n eruptions (Chiapas, Mexico) Dmitri Rouwet1*, Marta Iorio2 and Demetrio Polgovsky Journal of Applied Volcanology 2013, 2:6 doi:10.1186/2191-5040-2-6 "Volcanic risk perception may drastically decrease after eruptions and during periods of volcanic quiescence. The program uses a novel approach to poll risk perception and to transmit knowledge of El Chichón among 6- to 11-year old children by combining scientific information sessions with arts workshops. OK, thats something I always like to add - an example of a cool communication strategy in applied volcanology

Proposal for the recent developement section

2012 study on Volcanologists and the generation of knowledge and expert advice on various active volcanoes

The aftermath of the 2007 Soufrière Hills eruption in Montserrat

Donovan et al. (2012) provided a survey of volcanologists carried out during 2008 and 2009 and interviews with scientists in the United Kingdom, Montserrat, Italy and Iceland during fieldwork seasons. The survey identified various eruptions that had an influence on volcanology as a science and to assess the role of scientists in policymaking. The survey asked volcanologists to list those eruptions that they felt had most contributed to modern volcanology. The Soufrière Hills outbreak ranked third after Mount St. Helens (1980) and Pinatubo (1991). With regard to the political role, volcanologists have a strong focus on the academic importance of volcanology, and the physical and chemical processes that they study. Many hope that the application of Volcanology makes a difference for vulnerable societies, and a significant number are interested in hazard assessment and vulnerable populations. Especially the EU has recently started major research programs dealing with risk assessment, compare:

• NOVAC - Network for Observation of Volcanic and Atmospheric Change,
• MULTIMO Multidisciplinary Monitoring, Modelling and Forecasting of Volcanic Hazard, Explosive Eruption Risk and Decision Support for EU Populations Threatened by Volcanoes,
• ERUPT Processes and Timescale of Magma Evolution in Volcanic Systems
• E-RUPTIONS A Satellite Telecommunication and Internet-Based Seismic Monitoring System for Volcanic Eruption Forecasting and Risk Management
• EXPLORIS Explosive Eruption Risk and Decision Support for EU Populations Threatened by Volcanoes

According the field interviews, "hazard" had become a buzz word, and may have some negative impact on pure science. On the other hand, Scientists see a strong funding gap between university scientists and observatory scientists around the world. Observatory scientists earn less, publish less and have fewer resources in general.

A further section of the study dealt with the political and scientific role of the Montserrat eruption 1995 - 1997. The (1997) eruption, a classical example of an black swan event for the Montserratian people had major impacts on the local society and infrastructure. Two-thirds of the population left Montserrat after 1997.

The study quotes an interviewee (1997) "we were seeing phenomena that people had never seen before, the re-forming of pyroclastic flows, having flowed into the valley…went up the hill, over their houses, and then it just under gravity came back down, re-formed, and came along the Belham River valley". Being present at those events had a significant impact on scientists subsequent careers and laid base, for many, in a continued interest in Montserrat. Eruptions of such a dimension may be deemed ‗epistemological acts‘ as they significantly alter knowledge production. The scientists involved with Montserrat began (after 1995) to use statistical models to estimate the probabilities of particular events, but managed to built up experience-based expertise (including comparably subjective assessments from experts and local knowledge and experience) step by step. The subjectivity aspect has been critized in a comment on the study.

The authors conclude the study with the assumption, that Volcanology currently involves more research into risk assessment and risk management.

References

Discussion

Remark: Try suggestions for a different wording direct in the text above and provide notes in this section

I would suggest that this would sit a lot better as a section in the volcanic hazards article. Mikenorton (talk) 21:13, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

OK, will do so. Serten II (talk) 21:23, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Interesting on reading this 7 year old post, and the 2008 post above. I very recently found, and corrected volcano article which had become over simplified optimistic in relevant section, despite recognising that main reference article was volcanic hazards that explains matters fairly well after the input above.ChaseKiwi (talk) 02:46, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

Quality of article

Tend to agree with the crewbot today - multiple poorly sourced statements suggesting article has been left to drift. Needs a manual go over to bring back up in quality. Should be possible as fair number open source reviews in academic literature to use as secondary sources ChaseKiwi (talk) 16:38, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Made a start to improve quality but could do with help of others.ChaseKiwi (talk) 14:14, 17 January 2024 (UTC)