Tectonic Dyssynchrony (ePub)

Tectonic Dyssynchrony, as Karim describes, is a loss of synchronous motion of the earth's tectonic plates. Professor Karim, a doctorate in geophysics from a very prestigious American university, has a special interest in earth's seismic activity. He believes the tectonic dyssynchrony is responsible for an erratic gliding motion of the tectonic plates, thereby causing disastrous earthquakes, tsunamis, sinkholes, and a rare entity labeled as "spontaneous human combustion" or SHC for short.

The book describes an increase in frequency and intensity of earthquakes and tsunamis and also formation of sinkholes in our recent times; the sinkhole in Yamal Peninsula of Siberia was 262 feet wide! Many theories are advanced for the increase in earth's seismic activities, which are felt on the earth's surface, manifesting as massive tsunamis, just as the one seen in Japan recently and a more recent massive extrusion of lava on the island of Hawaii. Professor Karim believes that the erratic behavior of the tectonic plates is due to an excessive removal of very highly viscous crude oil from the earth's crust and its replacement with wash water. He postulates that the crude oil trapped within the inner crust of the earth serves as greasing material that facilitates smooth gliding of the tectonic plates and conversely removal of the lubricant, he believes, is the cause for jerky tectonic gliding. He believes that an incessant removal of the crude oil over the years has now reached a point where the minimum level of lubricant optimally required for a smooth gliding action is exhausted, thereby causing dyssynchrony in the plate motion or simply putting an erratic and jerky motion of the tectonic plates.

Karim's research put him on crossroads with the Big Oil. Big Oil was fighting on many fronts; the state governments and also the federal government had fi led lawsuits against the Big Oil. Oklahoma town meetings and street protests were everyday frontline news, and some universities researching the effects of greenhouse gases had contradicted many of the Big Oil-sponsored researches. Even some private foundations had sued the Big Oil. Big Oil was afraid of a greater governmental oversight, which may even prompt an injunction supporting a moratorium on future drilling all because of the irrefutable findings presented by Professor Karim's research. In an attempt to thwart Professor Karim's research, Big Oil offered Karim a very lucrative contract to join the research team of the Big Oil, a contract that Karim decided to forego as the contract deprived him the intellectual property right to his own research. The Big Oil attempted several illegal means to stop Karim, but he persisted, by luck or sheer perseverance. They even staged a car accident that demolished his Mini to smithereens, but Karim suffered only a few bruises. Karim was forced to leave the world-renowned and prestigious Massachusetts College of Technology in Boston and go into hiding in a third-world country where he continued his research incognito and used an alias as his life was under a constant threat.

The story is a science-based fiction that will take the reader on a journey along with Karim on his travel from Africa to California to Boston and onward to Madagascar, sharing his research, observations, experiences, and love for trivia. The story will take the searching mind to a futuristic world of artificial intelligence-assisted holographic presentation and a science of induced (man-made) seismicity, the discovery and use of the measure of gravitational waves, and onward to a mystical world of beliefs and predictions. The book will incite the reader to think out of the box and be more like Karim in their outlook-a world citizen.