Forecastle

“ M., and all hands, being mostly in their nightclothes, made haste to the forecastle, the water coming in at once. There they remained; the passengers in the forecastle, the crew above it, doing what they could. Every wave lifted the forecastle roof and washed over those within. The first man got ashore at nine; many from nine to noon. At flood-tide, about half past three o'clock, when the ship 184 broke up entirely, they came out of the forecastle, and Margaret sat with her back to the foremast, with her hands on her knees, her husband and child already drowned. ”

“ Even in so unscientific a science as economics there have been forecasts. And if I am right in saying that science aims at prophecy, and if the specialist in each science is in fact doing his best now to prophesy within the limits of his field, what is there to stand in the way of our building up this growing body of forecast into an ordered picture of the future that will be just as certain, just as strictly science, and perhaps just as detailed as the picture that has been built up within the last hundred years of the geological past? ”

“ The picture of this swarming concentrated humanity has some effective possibilities, but, unhappily, if, instead of that obvious rule-of-three sum, one resorts to an analysis of operating causes, its plausibility crumbles away, and it gives place to an altogether different forecast—a forecast, indeed, that is in almost violent contrast to the first anticipation. It is much more probable that these coming cities will not be, in the old sense, cities at all; they will present a new and entirely different phase of human distribution. ”

“ When that time comes—when the present limited horizon of each of us is practically extended over the entire country—and when the actual state of the weather over every part of it is known, at the same time, to the inhabitants of every other, and every where read in the light of a correct philosophy, prognostication will be comparatively simple and certain; and A PROGRESS will have been made, productive of an amount of pecuniary, intellectual, and social benefit to the people, which can not be overestimated. ”

“ But for some of us moderns, who have been touched with the spirit of science, prophesying is almost a habit of mind.
Science is very largely analysis aimed at forecasting. The test of any scientific law is our verification of its anticipations. The scientific training develops the idea that whatever is going to happen is really here now--if only one could see it. And when one is taken by surprise the tendency is not to say with the untrained man, "Now, who'd ha' thought it?" ”

“ Within the last twenty years, for example, methods of prediction based on the moon's movements, on the conjunctions of the planets, and on other relations, have been maintained with astonishing perseverance and constancy, in the face of what outsiders cannot but regard as a most discouraging want of agreement between the predicted weather and the actual progress of events. Here, as in so many cases of prediction, we find the justice of Bacon's aphorism, "Men mark when they hit, and never mark when they miss." ”

“ I hope you'll keep in mind that economic forecasting is far from a perfect science. If recent history is any guide, the experts have some explaining to do about what they told us had to happen but never did. ”

“ In order to forecast future cycles, the most important thing is to begin right, for if we have the right beginning, we will get the right ending. If we know the cause of the effect, then there can be no doubt about predicting the future event or effect. ”

“ Let us, therefore, throw into the ruins of astrology all still existing presumption to forecast for any extended time the character and changes of the weather, and aid, rather, by careful and honest tabulation of meteorological phenomena, in advancing a science whose foundations have already been laid by men of genius, and which in conjunction with the telegraph is furnishing its timely aid to agriculture and navigation. ”

“ Making no quack claims, the Bureau officials are discredited as to short-range or long-range forecasts, while the Wigginses and Devoes take the tripod and scatter storms, floods and dooms, as the irresponsible bad boy splashes water, and are acclaimed therefor. The essential fundamental difficulty of the question of forecasts is—aside from the blank misunderstanding of forecasts that are verified by results—that those who criticize forecasting not only exaggerate the percentage of error, but are wholly oblivious to the fact that forecasting is an art rather than a science. ”

“ No one can say how much rain will fall to-morrow in a given place, but we can predict with moderate accuracy how much will fall next year, and for a period of years a prediction can be made which accords very closely with the truth. ”

“ The physicist, for instance, if so inclined, can with but small expense take up the studies of atmospheric electricity, sky polarization, insolation, or any one or more of the many other interesting meteorological phenomena that are always with him, but which are not yet fully understood. In no other way could he add more to the advancement of his own subject, while at the same time he would be enriching the science of meteorology and thereby improving the art of forecasting. ”

“ But there is order and system in these changes, admirably illustrated in the weather forecasts of the present advanced stage of physical science, which are attainable only by continual watching of shifting conditions with application of fixed law to the appearance of wind and cloud and rain. But there are no forecasts without these two things, fixed laws and varying conditions for their application. With the wider generalization which admits of recognition of fixed law, there is always the narrower, concerned with variable conditions to which the wider is to be applied. ”

“ And so the first thing they know the opportunity to inquire how they feel has permanently gone by. Old Probabilities has a mighty reputation for accurate prophecy, and thoroughly well deserves it. You take up the paper and observe how crisply and confidently he checks off what to-day's weather is going to be on the Pacific, down South, in the Middle States, in the Wisconsin region. See him sail along in the joy and pride of his power till he gets to New England, and then see his tail drop. He doesn't know what the weather is going to be in New England. ”

“ The tendency, at present, among those who are desirous of forming a scheme of weather prediction, is to seek the origin of our weather-changes in changes of the sun's condition, and, by determining the laws of the solar changes, to ascertain the laws which regulate changes in the weather. ”

“ And yet there are a number of circumstances of which we should take account before attempting a confident forecast. Our hope for the future is based on what we have done in the past. But when we draw conclusions from past successes we should not lose sight of the conditions on which success has depended. ”

“ We may foretell what each season of the year will bring forth, when we cannot forecast the history of a blade of grass or a single grain of any kind. We may predict the amount of rain for a month, and be unable to prognosticate correctly, the character of any storm, or give the history of a special drop of water. ”

“ Then for their observations and predictions, they are such as will equally suit any age or country in the world. "This month a certain great person. will be threatened with death or sickness." This the newspapers will tell them; for there we find at the end of the year that no month passes without the death of some person of note; and it would be hard if it should be otherwise, when there are at least two thousand persons of note in this kingdom, many of them old, and the almanack-maker has the liberty of choosing the sickliest season of the year where he may fix his prediction. ”

“ He may spend much time in laborious searching; make many inquiries from persons whom he believes to be competent to advise him; diligently study the conditions upon which the problem before him depends—in short, he may take every reasonable precaution against the chances of failure, yet, in spite of all, he must necessarily incur risks. And so it is with regard to the task of forecasting the trend of industrial improvement. ”

“ Few things are more remarkable in the numerous and highly-varied experiments of vaticinatory fiction and more serious efforts of prognostication than the utter absence of any adequate attempt to forecast the future of the race itself. Social and political changes, the enormous differences which are certain to be effected in the manner of human life, have been from time to time more or less boldly imagined, and a couple of volumes of very able forecasts of the future have recently been published by a writer of singular vision and highly-trained scientific imagination. ”

“ The dream of representing the world inside a machine--of generating a robust, detailed, real-time forecast of climate states--reaches all the way back to the early days of meteorology. In 1922, the English mathematician Lewis Richardson proposed a thought experiment that he called “the forecast factory.” The idea is so wonderfully articulated (and so far-seeing) that it is worth quoting at length here:
Imagine a large hall like a theatre, except that the circles and galleries go right round through the space usually occupied by the stage. ”

“ With photographs illustrating the queer side of the matter.
IN most of the morning papers we are accustomed to the luxury of a detailed weather report and forecast. The majority glance at it with a sceptical smile. They are of opinion that in order to be on the safe side they must invert its message. If fine weather and sunshine are predicted, they sagely nod and take down the homely gamp. The prediction of a hurricane or stormy showers is the signal for leaving umbrellas and overcoats at home. ”

“ To make it an aim is to throw away the surest means of attaining it, namely attention to the full use of present resources in the present situation. Forecast of future conditions, scientific study of past and present in order that the forecast may be intelligent, are indeed necessities. Concentration of intellectual concern upon the future, solicitude for scope and precision of estimate characteristic of any well conducted affair, naturally give the impression that their [pg 267] animating purpose is control of the future. ”

“ Few people have any knowledge of the science beyond that supplied them by the forecasts and charts in the daily papers. Consequently the charts, which are more or less abstruse, are only understood by the few, and the forecasts are indulgently tolerated as a description of useless fortune-telling, rendered respectable by scientific recognition. ”

“ With the principles of this science all the more reliable rules of weather-forecasting are most intimately connected. We no longer think of judging of coming weather merely by the aspect of the sky and an examination of an individual barometer. We invariably refer—I do not say to the weather-reports of a few hours previous, for we often have neither these nor any weather-reports at all at hand—but we invariably refer to rules already deduced from the long study of weather-maps. The man who ignores these rules had better, in my opinion, leave all attempts at weather-forecasting alone. ”

“ When one thinks of the accumulation of meteorological minutiæ which is resulting from the preservation of the reports from so many places as to the wind, rain, sunshine, and all the rest of it, one may be tempted to ask whether it is worth the trouble it involves? If the observations are of use to those who want to know the probable state of the weather during the next twenty-four hours, where can be the utility of tabulating them year after year with as much care as is exercised in the registering of births, marriages, and deaths? ”

“ At the beginning of a year it is natural to speculate on what events that year may produce, but speculation does not influence the event. The farmer may make shrewd conjectures as to the next summer's weather ”

“ The labour involved in gathering the data for a forecast of the inventions likely to produce important effects during the twentieth century has been chiefly that of selecting from out of a vast mass of heterogeneous ideas those which give promise of springing up amidst favourable conditions [Pg xii] and of growing to large proportions and bearing valuable fruit. ”

“ If you follow the weather report, you 491will know days before what the weather, in all probability, will be, and the report seldom fails. Even ten years ago, who would have thought that he could so soon find in the newspaper the almost unfailing prophecy of the skies of the coming day! Think of the millions of anxious faces which have turned sky-ward since the earth began! What eager and ignorant eyes have peered upward, to descry the portents of the unseen, yet brooding storm. ”

“ At the present time, when weather prophecies have come to form a recognized part of our complex social machinery, it would be ungrateful to omit noticing that Hooke was the first to propose a scientific system of meteorological forecasting. ”

“ Is it surprising that in human affairs still less prediction is possible? There are countless unmeasured factors in human action. Such generalizations as are possible must be based on actions that appear and reappear with practical constancy. Though a number of facts unite to suggest some conclusions as to the immediate future, the experience of the last century bids one beware of sweeping predictions. ”