The progression of meteorology
Randy Mann.
JAKE PARRISH/Press
The advancement of meteorology has taken huge strides, especially in recent years. Meteorology is the study of the atmosphere and its phenomena, plus its interaction with the earth’s surface oceans and life in general. The term itself goes back to the Greek philosopher Aristotle. He wrote a book about 340 B.C. on natural philosophy entitled “Meteorologica.” It was the sum of weather and climate at that time.
Meteorology became a genuine natural science toward the end of the 16th century (1583) when a crude thermometer was invented by Galileo. It wasn’t perfected, however, until 1714 by Gabriel Daniel Fahrenheit. In 1643, the barometer was created to measure air pressure. In the late 1700s, the hygrometer, an instrument to measure the air’s water vapor content, was also invented.
The science of meteorology progressed as better instruments were developed. It became more widely recognized by the 1950s as high-speed computers were created to help solve equations that described the atmosphere’s behavior. Over the last several decades, computer models have become so sophisticated that short-term and even long-term forecasts have become more accurate.
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