SUMMARY OF THE 5 PRINCIPLES SUGGESTED BY VAROTSOS ET-AL [1996] AND THE ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS RAISED IN THIS DEBATE

The present paper cannot be considered, either as a rebuttal to any pa rticipant, or our overview of the debate. Its publication became neces sary due to the fact that various participants raised additional quest ions, i.e., beyond the points suggested by Varotsos et al. [1996]. We clarify these questions that concern the noise discrimination from our electrical recordings, the recent laboratory experiments which suppor t the emission of electrical precursors, and the question on whether, or not, a retroactive adjustment of the VAN prediction parameters was made, after the period 1987-1989 discussed in this debate. We draw att ention to the fact that a continuous 9 year (i.e., 1987-1995) sample o f VAN predictions is now available. For the benefit of the reader, the present paper also summarizes the essence of the five Principles sugg ested by Varotsos et al. [1996] (as a consequence, attention is drawn to a correct definition of the success rate). This essence remains exa ctly the same as it was initially suggested, because we do not feel, a fter the debate, that the various contributions cast a, sound doubt on the correctness of any of these Principles. The calculations which cl aim that VAN predictions can be ascribed to chance strongly violate th ese Principles; the incorrectness of these calculations is beyond any doubt, because they ''reject'' even an ideal earthquake prediction met hod. On the other hand, several well founded calculations convince tha t the VAN's success (and alarm) rate is very far beyond chance. The-st udy of this paper is highly recommended to the reader before going thr ough the details of each of our individual Replies.