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Published in:
Introduction: Analogue Computers in the History of Computing Read chapter Read first chapter

2010 | OriginalPaper | Chapter

8. The Analogue Dishpan: Physical Modelling Versus Numerical Calculation in Meteorology

Author : Dr. Charles Care

Published in: Technology for Modelling

Publisher: Springer London

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Abstract

The history of meteorology is intimately related to the history of the computer, weather forecasting being one of the first applications of the (digital) American Eniac. In the history of computing literature, meteorology is always presented as an area dominated by digital. This chapter takes a look at this application area and finds that where analogue devices were used, they were generally not electrical, and seldom referred to as computers. We will see how Lewis Fry Richardson, a well-known pioneer of numerical weather modelling, also used physical modelling techniques. Following the story of the technique he proposed, we move on to discuss the work of Dave Fultz, a meteorology researcher who argued for the benefits of complementing mathematical study with experimental techniques. Whether or not these experimental techniques should be considered computers, there is a close relationship between them and analogue computing, and they certainly form part of the history of pre-computational modelling. This chapter stresses the importance of situating analogue computing within a wider history of modelling technology.

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previous chapter Analogue–Digital Decisions in British Aeronautical Research
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Footnotes
1
Dahan Dalmedico (2001) p. 396. In a recent history of numerical forecasting, Kristine Harper described numerical weather prediction as ‘the major advance in 20th-century meteorology’ (Harper 2003, p. 690).
 
2
Historiographical consensus is that computational influences were pivotal in the history of twentieth century meteorology. Edwards (2000) states that ‘[b]y the 1960s, increasing computer power made possible detailed simulations of the general circulation of Earth’s atmosphere. This, in turn, allowed scientists to simulate weather and climate…’ (p. 222).
 
3
Nebeker (1995) p. 1. Nebeker supports his argument of this three-fold separation with a quote from Napier Shaw, a contemporary British Meteorologist (pp. 10, 195). In fact Nebeker’s three-way analysis closely mirrors Shaw’s history of meteorology (Shaw 1926, p. 320). Nebeker describes how the three distinct fields emerged during the nineteenth century, the increasing numbers of active researchers encouraging specialism into disparate cultures.
 
4
Harper (2003) p. 669.
 
5
See Richardson (1922b), preface.
 
6
Agar acknowledges that Nebeker identifies ‘the interplay between theory, observation, and organisation.’ For example: ‘the development of equations connected to designs of practical Meteorological Office organization, new ways of gathering data, and, completing the circle, further theory development’. Agar (1997) p. 119.
 
7
Agar (1997) p. 118.
 
8
Edwards (2000) p. 248, Nebeker (1995) p. 181.
 
9
Woolard (1922) p. 173.
 
10
Bjerknes was called into practical forecasting work during the aftermath of war and therefore favoured those methods that would deliver results quickly. Hunt (1998).
 
11
Shaw (1885) p. 164, Scott and Curtis (1886) pp. 382–383.
 
12
Nebeker (1995) p. 168, Merzbach (1970) p. 12. See also Hess (1957), Gierasch (1982).
 
13
Boulding (1985) wrote that Richardson ‘laid the foundations for the theory behind [modern] computerized weather predictions’ (p. 461). Today, both a number in turbulent fluid theory and an annual prize awarded by the Royal Meteorological Society bear his name.
 
14
Lynch (2006) frontispiece.
 
15
See Bailey (1993) pp. 77–78, Campbell-Kelly and Aspray (1996) pp. 54–57, Grier (2005) pp. 142–144, Williams (1999).
 
16
Richardson managed the calculations by splitting them up by region, a technique known commonly today as ‘domain decomposition’ (Lynch 2006, p. 247). Bailey (1993) likens the forecast factory to a modern parallel computer with a large number of individual processing units passing information to their neighbouring units (p. 77).
 
17
Richardson (1922b) pp. 219–220.
 
18
While the forecast factory was always described as a fantasy—‘Richardson’s dream’ to quote Peter Lynch—the reality of human computing organisation based on factory economics was a reality. The Oxford English Dictionary records that the original usage of ‘computer’ refers to humans engaged in calculation or reckoning. There is now a significant body of literature surrounding the topic of ‘human computers’, see Grier (2005). In developing his mathematical method, Richardson hoped that the weather could be computed with the same reliability as the British Nautical Almanac, another successful large scale (human) computing project (Aspray 1990b, p. 127).
 
19
Richardson was a Quaker, and his insistence in the creation of an idyllic environment around the forecast factory where workers could benefit from fresh air is clearly inspired by the tradition.
 
20
Richardson’s whole career can be interpreted in terms of the application of mathematical modelling. This theme is clear in the recent review of his work by Hunt (1998). Nicholson (1999) noted that through all of his work ran the common theme of mathematical analysis and ‘rigorous statistical methods’ (p. 542).
 
21
Ashford (1985) p. 71.
 
22
We can assume that Fultz became aware of this early work from the description of the forecast factory. Oliver Ashford, Richardson’s future biographer, supplied Fultz with a copy of Richardson’s manuscript notes (Fultz et al. 1959, p. 4).
 
23
He graduated in 1903 with first class honours in part I of the natural sciences tripos (Anon. 1903).
 
24
Ashford (1985) would later write that ‘he drifted from job to job, with little sense of continuity’ (p. 19). While Richardson was certain that he wanted to be a researcher, he was still discovering the areas in which his interests lay. In this sense, Hayes (2001) likens Richardson’s first decade of work with the experience of the modern post-doctoral fellow, a career path punctuated by many short-term contracts (p. 10).
 
25
His experiences on the Western Front would later motivate him to develop mathematical models of war, although these investigations did not receive significant scholarly recognition until after his death. See Richardson (1957), Hunt (1998), Nicholson (1999). Nicholson explained that it was natural for Richardson to develop mathematical accounts of his experience: ‘Wilfred Owen, Seigfried Sassoon, Robert Graves and other littérateurs wrote poems, autobiography and autobiographies disguised as novels; Richardson wrote equations’ (p. 544).
 
26
Examples include a technique to measure wind direction and speed by projecting spheres into the air, and various work on weather balloons.
 
27
Hayes (2001) p. 10, Lynch (2006) p. 254, Ashford (1985), Anon. (1929, 1953), Gold (1953).
 
28
Hayes (2001) p. 10, Searle is noted for his emphasis in experiment; especially its use in the education of physics. See Woodall and Hawkins (1969), French (2006).
 
29
Sir David Brunt quoted in Gold (1954).
 
30
Hunt (1998) observes that Richardson was fairly unique in not having stayed home to undertake scientific research as part of the War effort: ‘This was the first major war in which leading scientists were called on by the armed forces and used to great effect, particularly in aerodynamics (G.I. Taylor at Cambridge, L. Prandtl at Göttingen), ballistics (J.E. Littlewood at Cambridge), and the chemistry of explosives and gases (C. Weizmann at Manchester)’ (pp. xix–xx).
 
31
Herbert Morrell quoted in Ashford (1985) p. 57.
 
32
Described by Ashford (1985) p. 113, and published as Richardson (1922a).
 
33
Ashford noted how in later life Richardson had repaired a galvanometer at Paisley College when the laboratory technician’s poor eye sight prevented him from doing it. He also managed all of his own weather instruments. See Ashford (1985) p. 16.
 
34
Richardson’s interests in experiment and mathematics initiated his career in meteorology, while his pacifism, combined with first hand experience of the Western Front between 1916 and 1919, later directed his research towards the mathematical modelling of war. See Richardson (1957) p. 301, Lynch (2006) pp. 254–255, Ashford (1985) p. 71.
 
35
Lynch (2006) describes how the idea of applying the numerical methods Richardson had devised in 1910 to meteorology had come to him gradually. The first record of a specific connection is in a letter to Pearson dated 1907, but Richardson’s serious investigations on numerical forecasting began during his employment at Eskdalemuir.
 
36
The text was well received by Napier Shaw who proposed that the society fund the book’s publication. Ashford (1985) p. 49, Lynch (2006, p. 254).
 
37
Richardson (1916–1919).
 
38
Richardson (1916–1919).
 
39
Richardson (1916–1919). Also see Ashford (1985) p. 71.
 
40
Richardson (1916–1919).
 
41
Ashford (1985) noted that ‘[t]he facilities available in France were obviously inadequate for Richardson himself to follow up these ideas.’ (p. 71).
 
42
In other notes dating from this period, Richardson was developing various instruments for use with weather balloons. His interest in weather balloons was presumably motivated by the data he required in order to further the research into numerical forecasting.
 
43
The relative merits of the two approaches are themselves complex, however we can identify a number of factors that were key to Richardson as he was working in 1918. Firstly, there is the matter of practicality. Working close to the front line, paper-based numerical investigations were far easier to manage. Richardson described his wartime office as ‘a heap of hay in a cold rest billet’ (Richardson 1922b, p. 219). However, the adoption of numbers came at a price. Recent scholarship by Lynch estimates that Richardson must have spent the majority of two years working through his sample forecast (Lynch 1993, p. 69). Lynch noted that for ‘useful and timely predictions, the calculations would need to go several times faster than the atmosphere… the establishment of a ‘practical’ forecast-factory would have reduced the ranks of the unemployed by over a million’ (Lynch 2006, p. 261). Within that context, the idea of creating a ‘working model of the atmosphere’ to simplify predictions would have been very attractive.
 
44
Fultz et al. (1959) p. 4.
 
45
Fultz et al. (1959) notes that it was not until Ferguson Hall working at the University of Chicago constructed a laboratory model of a ‘hurricane-like vortex’ with an aluminium dishpan, that useful quantitative measurements began to be made (p. 3).
 
46
James Thomson 1892, as cited in Fultz et al. (1959) p. 4. © American Meteorological Society. Reprinted with permission.
 
47
Fultz et al. (1959) p. 5.
 
48
See Busemann (1960) p. 197.
 
49
Malone (1951) p. v. The project was directed by a committee of seven prominent meteorologists and chaired by H.G. Houghton.
 
50
Rouse (1951), Brunt (1951). Rouse was extensively involved in the use of analogue methods (particularly tanks), see Hubbard (1949); Brunt retired the same year from his professorship at Imperial, and developed a second career in civil administration, leading the Electricity Supply Research Committee and continuing with chairing the Brunt Committee who advised the DSIR on high speed computing. See Agar (1996).
 
51
Fultz (1951) p. 1235.
 
52
Fultz (1951) p. 1235. © American Meteorological Society. Reprinted with permission.
 
53
Lorenz (1995) p. 87. A number of recent publications on the use of models in scientific culture have made reference to Dave Fultz. Paul Krugman uses Fultz as an example of physical modelling in his analysis of modelling in economics (Krugman 1994).
 
54
Fultz’s Ph.D. thesis was entitled Upper-air trajectories and weather forecasting. Clearly a practical experimenter, included in his thesis is a card slide rule for deriving vorticity trajectories.
 
55
Lorenz (1995), p. 92, University of Chicago (2002).
 
56
The hemispheres were Pyrex flasks sized 5 litres and 3 litres. See Fultz (1949).
 
57
AIP (1989).
 
58
Faller (1956).
 
59
White (1968).
 
60
Tom Spence quoted in University of Chicago (2002) © University of Chicago News Office, reprinted with permission.
 
61
Fultz (1961) p. 2.
 
62
See Sect. 4.2.4, p. 83, above.
 
63
Vines (2000) p. 58.
 
64
Vines (2000) p. 41.
 
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Metadata
Title
The Analogue Dishpan: Physical Modelling Versus Numerical Calculation in Meteorology
Author
Dr. Charles Care
Copyright Year
2010
Publisher
Springer London
Book
Technology for Modelling

Print ISBN: 978-1-84882-947-3

Electronic ISBN: 978-1-84882-948-0

Copyright Year: 2010

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-84882-948-0_8

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