Advertisement - Click to support our sponsors.

For the answers
to all your earthly
questions, ask
a scientist

By Helen Altonn
Star-Bulletin

When does a hill become a mountain? How much carbon makes up the Earth? What is Pele's hair made of? How did Hawaii's volcanoes form? What is the weight and volume of Earth?

This is just a sampling of the diverse questions directed to the University of Hawaii's "Ask-an-Earth-Scientist" Web site: http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/GG/ASK

Ken Rubin, assist professor of geology and geophysics, created the Web site for fun in late 1994 and early 1995 with other faculty members and some students in his department. "We thought it might be nice if people had questions about geology to write back in."

Now, it's almost too popular, he said. "We get so many requests and everyone who participates feels bad when they can't answer all of them."

He said he took on the project in the beginning partly as a programming challenge. "I wanted to understand how to write a program that could take information off the Web page and send it out to people."

Programs can be bought now but they had to do it all themselves then, he said. "It was exciting. It was fun."

Requests for information have grown over the years and the scientists have found that many people go to the site just to read responses to previous questions.

Rubin said the information is a little more organized in terms of how it's cataloged.

Eventually, the scientists hope the information will be "partly encyclopedic," so people wanting information on a particular topic can go right to it, he said. Or they can follow links to other sites to get answers.

Seven faculty members work with Rubin, the Web site coordinator, in answering questions. But they come and go, he said. "A number of people in the last year asked to be taken off because the traffic is so high."

Since the volume of questions is so great, the scientists follow certain criteria in choosing those that they answer, Rubin said -- "Those that are the most interesting or they haven't answered before."

Most people are asking questions just because they're curious, he said. "That's really what we wanted originally, plus some outreach to Hawaii."

About one-fourth of the requests are from Hawaii; the rest from around the world. Often, there are more than 50 per day.

A fair number of questions are from Hawaii teachers about geology, environment and other topics of local interest, Rubin said.

Many questions concern Hawaiian volcanoes. But the environment -- acid rain, water and air pollution -- in Hawaii and elsewhere is probably the most common topic, the scientists have found.

General questions are asked about volcanology, seismology, hydrology and sedimentology.

People want to know about Hawaii's black sand beaches and they ask about the origins of rock salt, clays, quartz, mudstone and other minerals and rocks.

They want to learn more about earthquakes and tsunamis and possible local threats from such hazards.

Students looking to the Web site to do their homework can forget it. "We can kind of tell when we're getting someone's homework question," Rubin said.

But if someone is working on a homework assignment or project and has given it a lot of thought and hit a wall, he said, "we would give them an answer, if we could, to help.

"We just sort of don't respond to incredibly general, unthoughtful questions."

The site has about 100 pages and Rubin is reorganizing it this summer.

He also plans to add a new topic to the site focusing on issues of evolution, creationism and the origin of life.

"We feel it's important without trying to take a stand on those topics -- obviously it is very politically charged -- to provide some of the facts on which Darwinian evolution, the origin of species, is based."

Many volunteer hours go into the unique, labor-intensive site, which has been endorsed by the "Scout Report for Science and Engineering."

The citation said: "Answers are thoughtful and content-rich, although many are specific to the Hawaiian Islands (as expected.)

"This is a wonderful resource for students wishing to interact with established scientists or educators seeking clear and interesting explanations of natural phenomena."

The site also was an Editor's Choice for "Bonus.com -- the supersite for kids," and has received a "Study Web Excellence Award."