What is an "earthquake"?
An earthquake is any shaking of the ground - usually intense shaking of the ground - caused by either natural sources or by humans. The most common types of earthquakes are those caused by ruptures of geologic faults or earthquakes associated with volcanic activity.

1.什么是地震?
任何地动-通常是强烈的地动,无论是由自然力引起还是由人为引起,都叫地震。最常见的地震是那些由断层或者是火山活动引起的。

What are the different types of earthquakes?
There are three major types of earthquake. Firstly, geologic earthquakes - sometimes called tectonic earthquakes - are caused by the rupturing of faults in the earth's crust. There are volcanic earthquakes, caused by the movement of magma in volcanoes. Lastly, there are various types of earthquakes caused by man-made activities, for example, explosions or the collapse of large structures.

地震分几种?
地震主要分三种。首先,地质地震-有时也叫做构造地震-是由地球的地壳层破裂造成的。还有火山地震,有火山岩浆运动引起。最后,有很多种地震是由人类活动造成的。比如,爆炸和大型建筑物倒塌。



Can earthquakes be predicted?
Whether earthquakes can be predicted is a very difficult question for we seismologists to answer. Certainly, there are things that we can predict about earthquakes. For example, we know where earthquakes are going to occur: primarily on large geologic faults. We know how big those earthquakes might be. For example, on the San Andreas Fault here in California, we know earthquakes can be as large as magnitude 8. The difficulty is that we cannot predict when large earthquakes will occur with any kind of reliability or precision needed to warn communities of impending disasters.

地震能否被预测?
这个问题我们地震学家很难给出回答。当然,有些与地震有关的事宜是可以预知的。例如,我们知道地震将发生在哪里:主要发生在大的地质断层上。我们知道那些地震有多强烈。比如,在加利福尼亚的圣安地列斯断层,我们知道地震最高可达8级。难点在于,我们不能作出可靠、准确的预测,判断地震何时会发生,以便警示人们灾难的降临。


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