Could we predict the weather without computers?

Question

Could we predict the weather without computers?

Answer 1

The invention of the telegraph improved weather predictions because knowing the conditions in one while noting prevailing wind directions it was possible to predict who would get it next.  The long waves produced by a hurricane traveled at a much greater speed than the storm often reaching a shore in time to warn of the approaching storm.  Computers help a great deal by processing large volumes of data, comparing it to weather models and historical weather and generating weather maps.  There is still a practical limit for computers to predict weather into the future.

Answer 2

People were able to before computers came along. You can tell what the weather will do by how humid it is, hot or cold it is and what the clouds look like and what directions they're heading. Its not possible to accurately predict the weather more than a couple days in advance though because winds and temps change constantly.

Answer 3

yess

Answer 4

It's going to rain when the cows lie down!

apparrently...

Answer 5

it's possible, but no more than a day or so in advance (like farmers learned to "predict" the weather so they knew whether to start planting/harvesting). People used to do it for centuries. It's supposed to be more accurate now with computers and there are less miscalculations, but yes, it's possible.

Answer 6

You could.. Just not as well.

Answer 7

Of course, but it was more difficult without.

Answer 8

You don't need a computer to determine by the colour of the sunset that it's gonna rain next day. Neither do you need a computer to know that if it's foggy in the morning, the rest of the day will be sunny.

Of course, whatever methods we use, they are all limited. You can't predict weather with 100% certainty. Especially not in the UK ;-)

Answer 9

sure...fishermen do predict the weather without technology...i mean old fisherman not those with technology&no brains of their own.......in d past there was no technology and was all predicted by observations...like type of clouds, sea level, moon, visibility....so yes it could be predicted without technology...

Answer 10

People were predicting the weather long before computers came along.  Computers have only been common since the 1980s.

Answer 11

Yes - predict that the weather tomorrow will be the same as the weather today and you'll be right more often than your wrong.

Answer 12

If we could read all the signs, I believe the weather could be predicted best by reading the signs in nature  - fauna and flora.

Many animals are more finely attuned to subtle changes in the weather than we are.  I have little doubt that slugs have an idea when rain is coming, and possibly ducks too!

Even plants can probably read subtle weather changes.  They have had millions of years to evolve.

Computers probably help to predict the weather more accurately now, than they could before computers were invented. But remember the barometer!? At one time, every house had one.

Answer 13

yes we can predict weather without computers but to no where as near the accuracy we do today as the amount of data needed is too big

weather predictions 25-30 years ago were using the super computers of the time which were equivalent to a 1GHz processor with 128MB RAM and that was a huge super computer of the day of course because the power of the machine was quite small compared to todays computers the computer could not process enough data to achieve an accurate prediction, today supercomputers are equally as big but capable of 10THz (1tera hertz = 1 thousand giga hertz) and they have hundreds of gigabytes of high speed RAM to process data very rapidly, because the computers are so powerful the software with computer can calculate billions of pieces of data very rapidly and come up with a fairly accurate prediction of the weather from satellite imagery and weather stations etc...

Answer 14

No.  Even with computers, it's hopeless to predict it more than a few days ahead.

Weather is a very chaotic system that exhibits sensitive dependence on initial conditions.  That is, unless you know the initial conditions perfectly everywhere, the errors in your predictions will grow and grow until your predictions are useless.

Answer 15

yes, i predicted it would p**s down 3 times lately...

1 - when we were having a BBQ.

2 - when the hopings were coming to Newcastle

3.- when the sky was full of black clouds the other day

Each time I was right

Answer 16

yes, but not as accurately...even though our weather prediction at the moment is poor and highly inacurrate it would be even worse without the use of modern day computers with all there forecasting gadgets & gizmos.