The laboratory routine, which involves a great deal of measurement, filing, and tabulation, is either my lifeline or my chief handicap, I hardly know which.

In every area of the world where there is earthquake risk, there are still many buildings of this type; it is very frustrating to try to get rid of them.

The most remarkable feature about the magnitude scale was that it worked at all and that it could be extended on a worldwide basis. It was originally envisaged as a rather rough-and-ready procedure by which we could grade earthquakes. We would have been happy if we could have assigned just three categories, large, medium, and small; the point is, we wanted to avoid personal judgments. It actually turned out to be quite a finely tuned scale.

Don't wait for extraordinary circumstance to do good; try to use ordinary situations.

No joy in nature is so sublimely affecting as the joy of a mother at the good fortune of a child.

Nothing is less predictable than the development of an active scientific field.

Only fools, liars, and charlatans predict earthquakes