From sensory cues to universal laws: The great schism in the history of weather prediction

“ The older and more experienced men would read the sky and explain the various appearances, and there is little doubt that from keen observation they were able to foretell the weather with considerable accuracy. They possessed a stock of weather lore of which we, in these days of barometers and storm-signals, know little. ”

“ In Shetland there is an old rhyme concerning the movements of the rain-goose, or red-throated diver: If the rain göse flees ta da hill, Ye can geng ta da haf whin ye will; But whin shö gengs ta da sea, Ye maun draw up yir boats an’ flee. According to an old Cumberland saying: If’t cums on rain when t’teyde’s at flowe, You may yoke t’plew on any knowe [knoll] ; Bit if it cums when t’teyde’s at ebb, Then lowse yer plew an’ gang to bed.
Perhaps the commonest of all sayings concerning the weather is: A red sky at night Is the shepherd’s delight ”

“ It was the rise of the scientific spirit, of the fruitful conception of a world lapped in universal law. For two centuries men had gradually become accustomed to the thought of an external nature governed by an unbreakable chain of cause and effect, but it was still believed that man, with his free will, was an exception and that history, therefore, consisting of the sum total of humanity's arbitrary actions, was incalculable and in large part inexplicable. ”

“ Harmonious in their action, the air and sea are obedient to law and subject to order in all their movements; when we consult them in the performance of their manifold and marvellous offices, they teach us lessons concerning the wonders of the deep, the mysteries of the sky, the greatness, and the wisdom, and goodness of the Creator, which make us wiser and better men. The investigations into the broad-spreading spreading circle of phenomena connected with the winds of heaven and the waves of the sea are second to none for the good which they do and for the lessons which they teach. ”

“ Can the mere breath of the seasons, the weight or lightness of the atmosphere, the outward gloom or smile of the brute mass called Nature, affect us thus? Out on this empty science, this vain knowledge, this little lore, if we are so fooled by the vile clay and the common air from our one great empire, self! Great God! hast thou made us in mercy, or in disdain? Placed in this narrow world, darkness and cloud around us; no fixed rule for men; creeds, morals, changing in every clime, and growing like herbs upon the mere soil,—we struggle to dispel the shadows; we grope around ”

“ Where the finite and material drop our view, the infinite and spiritual extend and enlarge it. The barometer, that little prophet of storm and sunshine, denying the evidences of the senses, points to fair weather in the midst of murky clouds and drenching rain. To material sense, severing the jugular vein takes away the Life of man, but, in fact and in science, Life goes on the same, it being eternal. ”

“ It has no doubt struck all persons who love to look at nature, how different the skies are in different countries. I fancy Irish or French clouds are as characteristic as Irish or French landscapes. It would be well to have a Daguerreotype and get a series of each. Some way beyond Dunmanna the road takes us through a noble savage country of rocks and heath. Nor must the painter forget long black tracts of bog here and there, and the water glistening brightly at the places where the turf has been cut away. Add to this, and chiefly by the banks of rivers, a ruined old castle or two ”

“ This breathing of the solid earth seems to afford a wide field for scientific activity. It would be premature to speculate as to how far it will be possible to educe law from what is now chaotic; but it is clear that the co-operation of many observers will be required to separate the purely local from the true terrestrial changes. ”

“ As we have seen, certain wells in our own land could control the weather. This was so, even when the guardian spirit of the spring assumed no definite shape. The rites required to obtain the desired object were nothing less than an acknowledgment of the spirit’s existence. The origin of the connection between weather and wells can only be guessed at. It appears that the splashing of a spring when an object was thrown into it, or the sprinkling of the water over the neighbouring ground, was thought to cause rain, through what may be called a dramatic representation of a shower. ”

“ There was a fountain in Munster such that if it were touched or even looked at by a human being it would at once flood the whole province with rain.” Curious survivals of ancient rain-charms are to be found in modern folk-customs. Thus, in connection with the [226] rejoicings of the harvest-home in England, when the last load of grain was being carried on the gaily decorated hock-cart to the farm-yard, it was customary to throw water on those taking part in the ceremony. This apparently meaningless frolic was in reality a rain-charm. ”

“ Mary’s Church, in North Uist. “The natives,” he says, “call it the ‘Water Cross,’ for the ancient inhabitants had a custom of erecting this sort of cross to procure rain, and when they had got enough, they laid it flat on the ground, but this custom is now disused.” Among the mountains of British Columbia, is a certain stone held in much honour by the Indians, for they believe that it will produce rain when struck. Rain-making is an important occupation among uncivilised races, and strange rites are sometimes practised to bring about the desired result. ”

“ The inference constantly suggested is, that laws are the creatures of climate, local situation, accident, or imposture—the fruit of any causes except those which appear to operate with tolerable constancy. ”

“ When we think of the laws of nature (which by continued observation have become known to us) as the proper tests to which any new fact or our theoretical representation of it should in the first place be subjected, let us contemplate their assured and large character. Let us go out into the field and look at the heavens with their solar, starry, and planetary glories; the sky with its clouds; the waters descending from above or wandering at our feet ”

“ The law of gravitation, which determines [15] the movements of the heavenly bodies, is equally exemplified in the fall of an apple to the ground. In fine, the universe consists of bodies of matter in motion; the movements which occur within the range of human observation are sufficient to enable us from them to calculate the paths which they follow when they pass beyond our ken, and the correctness of our calculations is demonstrated when they reappear at the time and place predicted. ”

“ I do not believe that there is now one object or event in all our experience of nature, within the bounds of the solar system at least, which has not either been ascertained by direct observation to follow laws of its own, or been proved to be closely similar to objects and events which, in more familiar manifestations, or on a more limited scale, follow strict laws: our inability to trace the same laws on a larger scale and in the more recondite instances, being accounted for by the number and complication of the modifying causes, or by their inaccessibility to observation. ”

“ Wishing to prove that the material world is an illusion of the senses, Mrs. Eddy tells us that on a wet day, when there is a downpour of rain, and when mist and fog shroud land and sea, we can easily assure ourselves that our senses are not telling us the truth, that the weather is really fine, by consulting a barometer, which in the midst of cloud and rain points to clear weather. What shall we think of the mentality of a woman who appeals to a barometer to prove that matter does not exist? ”

“ An observer may be under the centre of such accumulation or depression, he may be more or less distant from it, though within the influence of whatever horizontal movement of air may be caused by such temporary increase or diminution of pressure. Hence the barometer shows, and generally foretells, changes of wind ”

“ Familiar as the practical use of weather-glasses is, at sea as well as on land, only those who have long watched their indications, and compared them carefully, are really able to conclude more than that the rising glass [3] USUALLY foretells less wind or rain, a falling barometer more rain or wind, or both; a high one fine weather, and a low, the contrary. ”

“ The advantages of concert of action between the meteorologist on land and the navigator at sea were so obvious that, looking forward to the establishment of a universal system of meteorological observation upon both elements, it was thought that the consideration of scales would with greater propriety be left for that or some such occasion. ”

“ The study of the atmosphere and its phenomena. Efforts are being made by every civilized nation to apply to the benefit of mankind the knowledge we possess of meteorology, especially to foretell the winds and weather from day to day and the general character of the seasons from season to season. About fifty official governmental weather bureaus receive reports from their stations by telegraph daily, compile weather maps, issue forecasts, and publish weekly, monthly, or annual climatological summaries, together with frequent special meteorological memoirs. ”

“ Some idea may be formed of the comprehensive scale of the journal of this society, when it is known that it contains observations three times in the day of the barometer, thermometer in the shade and in the sun, hygrometer, magnetic needle, direction and force of the wind, quantity of rain and of evaporation, the height of any neighboring water, the changes of the moon, the appearance of the sky, and the occurrence of meteors and of the aurora borealis. ”

“ For the law may be the same while the quantities to which it applies are different. The law of the gravity which acts to the earth and to Jupiter, is the same; but the intensity of the force at the surfaces of the two planets is different. The law which regulates the density of the air at any point, with reference to the height from the earth’s surface, would be the same, if the atmosphere were ten times as large, or only one-tenth as large as it is; if the barometer at the earth’s surface stood at three inches only, or if it showed a pressure of thirty feet of mercury. ”

“ That an instrument so rude and so abundant in error as is the marine barometer generally in use should, in this age of invention and improvement, be found on board any ship, will doubtless be regarded hereafter with surprise; and it will be wondered how an instrument so important to meteorology, and so useful to navigation, should be permitted to remain so defective that meteorologists, in their investigations concerning the laws of atmospheric pressure, are compelled in great measure to omit all reference to the observations which have been taken with them at sea. ”

“ It is a well-known fact that the barometer is as much, or even more affected by a change of wind as it is by rain; and the objection raised against a simple barometer reading, as leaving the observer in doubt whether to expect wind or rain, is removed by the addition of the Hygrometer, an instrument indicating the comparative degree of dryness or dampness of the air;—a most important item in the determination of the coming weather. ”

“ Even in this country, and near the sea-level, storms are frequent with the barometer not below [Pg 11] 29; rain is not uncommon with the glass at 30; even fine weather sometimes occurs with a low pressure; while it is evident that at an elevation of a few thousand feet the mercury would never rise to 30 inches; hence, according to the scale, there should never be fair weather there. If tempests happened as seldom in our latitude as the barometer gets down to 28 inches, the maritime portion of the community at least would be happy indeed. ”

“ In weather which is showery rather than steadily wet, when between the intervals of sunshine a cloud appears in the W., passes over the spectator, and as it passes pours down a considerable quantity of rain, if the barometer be watched from the time of the cloud's appearance in the W., to its appearance in the E., it will be observed to fall a little and then to recover its original level, the fall being quite a local one. ”

“ Difficult as it is to foretell weather accurately, much useful foresight may be acquired by combining the indications of instruments (such as the barometer, thermometer, and hygrometer) with atmospheric [6] appearances. What is more varying than the aspect of the sky? Colour, tint of clouds, their soft or hard look, their outline, size, height, direction, all vary rapidly, yet each is significant. ”

“ In ancient times, no less than in the present, strange sights must have been witnessed. We have not a monopoly of thunderstorms, earthquakes, landslips, or deluges of rain. The same phenomena prevailed in early times. The difference is, that we have science to keep them in their proper place. During the heavy rains of January 1892, a spring near the house of Rurach, at Kintail, in Ross-shire, suddenly burst its bounds and became a raging torrent. ”

“ On the other hand, the local contraction by cold during night is greatest over land, where the air is clear, dry, and calm, or nearly so, and least over the ocean, where the air is clouded, and loaded with moisture. As familiar illustrations of atmospheric movements result ing from local expansions by heat and contractions by cold, we may refer to the land and sea breezes, and what de pend upon exactly the same principle, the dry and rainy monsoons in different parts of the globe. ”