exactly!

the reason i am being so pesemistic about this study is....

i am a geographer and was all psyched to do my thesis on urban sprawl. after a year of reseach on the subject, i had to scrap this idea... cause no one has an accepted definition of what urban sprawl even is; let alone how to measure it, or the effect it has.

maybe if i went to a different school with more resources i could have made it work but my advisors were all happy when i quit and moved to a more easily measured and quantifiable topic (but it was boring as hell).

so i'd just like to see what figures they pulled out of their @sses to make statements such as those you listed in your first post i wish i coulda pulled off something like that!!!