1871 artificial production of rain

[nt1]

War and Weather
1871

War and the Weather

books.google.com

Interesting to think about someone in 1871 researching battle dates and rain fall. Looking for a pattern to their thought or observation.

The plates were lost in the Chicago fire.

Gfyiydmnbdgbf

 

[theprestige]

War and Weather
1871

War and the Weather

books.google.com

Interesting to think about someone in 1871 researching battle dates and rain fall. Looking for a pattern to their thought or observation.

The plates were lost in the Chicago fire.

Gfyiydmnbdgbf

In this same time period, Herman Melville thought whales were a species of fish.

 

[junkshop]

War and Weather
1871

War and the Weather

books.google.com

Interesting to think about someone in 1871 researching battle dates and rain fall. Looking for a pattern to their thought or observation.

The plates were lost in the Chicago fire.

Gfyiydmnbdgbf

Tixjsjdmdjvh?

 

[Guybrush Threepwood]

In this same time period, Herman Melville thought whales were a species of fish.

No, he didn't.

 

[theprestige]

No, he didn't.

He says as much in Moby Dick, published a mere twenty something years earlier.

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

War and Weather
1871

War and the Weather

books.google.com

Interesting to think about someone in 1871 researching battle dates and rain fall. Looking for a pattern to their thought or observation.

The plates were lost in the Chicago fire.

Gfyiydmnbdgbf

The book is a list of battles after which it rained (or snowed). There is no control list of similar incidents in which it did not rain. And thus no consideration of probability.

Asking Google, "How many days a year does it rain?" produces answers tat are all over the map but one day in three maybe a good guess.

Unproven.

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

He says as much in Moby Dick, published a mere twenty something years earlier.

Google's AI tells me:

In Moby-Dick, the narrator Ishmael, speaking through Melville's voice, refers to whales as "spouting fish". While it was known that whales are mammals even during Melville's time, Ishmael in the book uses a colloquial, functionalist view where the whale's aquatic habitat leads to its classification as a "fish". Ishmael and the whalemen use "fish" to refer to whales in their daily language, and Ishmael aligns himself with this common usage. He dismisses the scientific classification of whales as mammals as irrelevant to his functional view.
While it's inaccurate to say Melville literally believed whales were fish in a modern scientific sense, his character Ishmael uses the term "fish" to describe whales based on their environment and common understanding among the whalemen. This is a matter of linguistic preference and functional classification, rather than a scientific claim.

It does go on to say: AI responses may include mistakes. YMMV.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

War and Weather
1871

War and the Weather

books.google.com

Interesting to think about someone in 1871 researching battle dates and rain fall. Looking for a pattern to their thought or observation.

The plates were lost in the Chicago fire.

If firing artillery produces rain, then we should be able to see that now in, for example, the Ukraine war. I do not believe we have.
This looks like a poorly-researched example of a post hoc logical fallacy to me.

Gfyiydmnbdgbf

Sorry, what?

 

[nt1]

Hi fellow members.

Im ever so glad this interested you enough to take time to comment. I hope there was something you enjoyed. This guy watched gunfights and the sky rain tears. I find it relatable in my observations of other worldly actions.

Does anyone find it interesting that the author was also able to document history while asking others to consider his observation of facts through references.
Like screenshots, a citation and a quote is worth nothing without the reader taking the time to fact check, themselves, the citation and quotes. Unlike this book and an other public text outside of a forum. You dont get to ask a book questions. Except to yourself. It's then the readers responsibility to either stop reading, fact check themselves, or enjoy it for what it is. Which is someone else's opinion, statement, claim, or any other deliverence.

Responding to a book or text with no attempt to perform one's own personal research is comparable to cavemen yelling at fire. If you are knowledgeable and yelling at a book, that's different. It still doesnt mean the book will respond. A book will respond to you. Only through your own equal effort that created it.

This is a forum though, so it's not applicable. The statement is just a thought that allows consideration.

Anyway. A book from 1871 discussing weather manipulation is an interesting subject for science. Did humans stop after this book? Are there any other investigations?
Is there anything of any value here? Those questions aren't directed at the forum members. They are just examples of what a thread about a 1871 book based on possible natural science could inspire.

Thank you for your input. I'm glad it inspired you in any way.

Edited grammar and punctuation. Enjoy quoting. Genuinely enjoy quoting.

 

[nt1]

Google's AI tells me:


It does go on to say: AI responses may include mistakes. YMMV.

Hi there. Im glad yiu used google AI for a response. I think that's valuable. Do you try other AI systems and comoare the responses? It would require multiple attempts at both systems or the amount of systems tried.

Id be interested in your oersonal results.

 

[nt1]

The book is a list of battles after which it rained (or snowed). There is no control list of similar incidents in which it did not rain. And thus no consideration of probability.

Asking Google, "How many days a year does it rain?" produces answers tat are all over the map but one day in three maybe a good guess.

Unproven.

Hi Gord

Thank you for that observation. What was the amount of your time spent on the research you based your reply? Genuine question.

Was it: a dismissal from a browsing of the book. A full read. A full read and comprehensive research. Was it a method not listed? Genuine question. Im interested to know.

 

[nt1]

No, he didn't.

Hi Guybrush teethwood

'He" and "didn't". Who and what are you referencing?

Could you please clarify your statement?

Thank you

 

[The Great Zaganza]

Witches and Shamans have done it for millennia - or so they thought.

 

[arthwollipot]

Anyway. A book from 1871 discussing weather manipulation is an interesting subject for science. Did humans stop after this book? Are there any other investigations?

Why, no, no they didn't. Cloud seeding has been subject to investigation for decades as a method of increasing rainfall, especially in arid countries. Unfortunately the evidence to support it is weak and inconsistent. It seems to work, sometimes, under certain specific kinds of conditions, but not reliably.

 

[Andy_Ross]

It didn't rain either during or after the battle of El Alamain which had one of the most intense artillery barrages of WW2

There wasn't any unusually rainy weather on the Western Front in WW1 and the artillery barrage on both sides that lasted for years was extremely intense.

 

[theprestige]

Google's AI tells me:


It does go on to say: AI responses may include mistakes. YMMV.

The AI (and thus probably the human reviewers that contributed the bulk of its corpus) overlooks a whole chapter of whale facts. In this chapter, Ishmael sets out to classify whales in a rational way. He specifically raises the question of whether they're fish or not, as one that vexed taxonomers of his time. He concludes that they are indeed fish. Not just colloquially (the way it's used elsewhere throughout the narrative), but rationally as well.

But that could have been Melville's humor.

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

The AI (and thus probably the human reviewers that contributed the bulk of its corpus) overlooks a whole chapter of whale facts. In this chapter, Ishmaelsets out to classify whales in a rational way. He specifically raises the question of whether they're fish or not, as one that vexed taxonomers of his time. He concludes that they are indeed fish. Not just colloquially (the way it's used elsewhere throughout the narrative), but rationally as well.

But that could have been Melville's humor.

Other sites confirm that some whalers sometimes called called whales fish as a sort of generic term for animals that lived in the sea.

And it's Ishmael the fictional character not Melville who makes the claim.

 

[zooterkin]

Other sites confirm that some whalers sometimes called called whales fish as a sort of generic term for animals that lived in the sea.

And it's Ishmael the fictional character not Melville who makes the claim.

And even if it were Melville, he's an author, not a scientist. Whales were known to be mammals at that time. (And, of course, there's no such thing as a fish.)

 

[theprestige]

Other sites confirm that some whalers sometimes called called whales fish as a sort of generic term for animals that lived in the sea.

Yes, colloquially. I have no problem with that. The narrator and others throughout the book use "fish" as a figure of speech for a whale. I don't take that to mean they thought it wasn't a mammal.

And it's Ishmael the fictional character not Melville who makes the claim.

The character is established as an intelligent and well-traveled man of the world. He's educated, experienced, and values rationality above superstition. He's further presented as a reliable and current narrator of facts related to whales and the whale fishery. The text gives us no reason to think Ishmael is speaking from ignorance when he details these things for the reader.

I think Melville was making a genuine attempt to bring his audience up to speed on the current state of the art.

And even if it were Melville, he's an author, not a scientist. Whales were known to be mammals at that time. (And, of course, there's no such thing as a fish.)

Which is kind of my point. Yes, some scientists had figured it out; that doesn't necessarily mean all educated people everywhere were immediately up to date on the latest developments in biology and taxonomy.

Which, by parallel to the OP, suggests that not all scientists of the late 1800s were up to date on the latest understandings of meteorology and weather formation. But as usual, nobody like an analogy. Oh well.

 

[Thermal]

OP was probably thinking more along the lines of HAARP than Ishmael.

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

Greenland where the whale fishes blow.

Greenland Whale Fisheries

Greenland_Whale_Fisheries^WP - colloquial and common use.

 

[kookbreaker]

The book is a list of battles after which it rained (or snowed). There is no control list of similar incidents in which it did not rain. And thus no consideration of probability.

Asking Google, "How many days a year does it rain?" produces answers tat are all over the map but one day in three maybe a good guess.

Unproven.

Up until 1871 (and for some time after), rain was often a spoiler of battles. Especially in the age of gunpowder where black powder is lovingly hydrophillic. The infamous Battle of the clouds was one example in the American Revolution.

Waterloo famously had torrential downpours before it. The battle is hardly unique in that respect, just the most famous.

Even if it were a correlation, its more a matter of commanders choosing to fight before the rain started to fall or trying to thread fights between storms.

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

Hi Gord

Thank you for that observation. What was the amount of your time spent on the research you based your reply? Genuine question.

Was it: a dismissal from a browsing of the book. A full read. A full read and comprehensive research. Was it a method not listed? Genuine question. Im interested to know.

15 minutes.

It is a list of incidents. And "correlation is not cause". Do your own Google.

How many battles were there that were not followed by storms? There is no analysis.

It is an amusing book but contains no proof.

arthwollipot mentions Cloud seeding^WP and much further work has been done. The results are

Despite decades of research and application, cloud seeding's effectiveness remains a subject of debate among scientists, with studies offering mixed results on its impact on precipitation enhancement.

Nothing like "every time a gun is fired it rains like hell".

 

[Guybrush Threepwood]

Yes, colloquially. I have no problem with that. The narrator and others throughout the book use "fish" as a figure of speech for a whale. I don't take that to mean they thought it wasn't a mammal.


The character is established as an intelligent and well-traveled man of the world. He's educated, experienced, and values rationality above superstition. He's further presented as a reliable and current narrator of facts related to whales and the whale fishery. The text gives us no reason to think Ishmael is speaking from ignorance when he details these things for the reader.
I think Melville was making a genuine attempt to bring his audience up to speed on the current state of the art .


Which is kind of my point. Yes, some scientists had figured it out; that doesn't necessarily mean all educated people everywhere were immediately up to date on the latest developments in biology and taxonomy.

Which, by parallel to the OP, suggests that not all scientists of the late 1800s were up to date on the latest understandings of meteorology and weather formation. But as usual, nobody like an analogy. Oh well.

I don't, I think he was showing us that Ishmael wasn't well educated. You made the claim that Melville himself thought whales were fish, do you have any evidence except your interpretation of the words of a character in one of his novels?

 

[Thermal]

I don't, I think he was showing us that Ishmael wasn't well educated. You made the claim that Melville himself thought whales were fish, do you have any evidence except your interpretation of the words of a character in one of his novels?

Did Dick really see Jane run, or was it a metaphor for the emerging women's liberation movement?

 

[nt1]

Civil-War-Weather Archives - Emerging Civil War

emergingcivilwar.com

Thank you all for you interesting participation. Its really helpful and fun to watch.

 

[nt1]

Technical Difficulties

Weather modification and war



Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques

Signed in Geneva May 18, 1977
Entered into force October 5, 1978
Ratification by U.S. President December 13, 1979
U.S. ratification deposited at New York January 17, 1980

the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives held hearings, beginning in 1972, and the Senate adopted a resolution in 1973 calling for an international agreement "prohibiting the use of any environmental or geophysical modification activity as a weapon of war...."

In response to this resolution, the President ordered the Department of Defense to undertake an in-depth review of the military aspects of weather and other environmental modification techniques. The results of this study and a subsequent interagency study led to the U.S. Governments decision to seek agreement with the Soviet Union to explore the possibilities of an international agreement.

 

[nt1]

Up until 1871 (and for some time after), rain was often a spoiler of battles. Especially in the age of gunpowder where black powder is lovingly hydrophillic. The infamous Battle of the clouds was one example in the American Revolution.

Waterloo famously had torrential downpours before it. The battle is hardly unique in that respect, just the most famous.

Even if it were a correlation, its more a matter of commanders choosing to fight before the rain started to fall or trying to thread fights between storms.

No matter what the correlation, it was an interesting helpful reply. I'll read up on your reference. Thank for the reply.

 

[theprestige]

Technical Difficulties

Weather modification and war



Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques

Signed in Geneva May 18, 1977
Entered into force October 5, 1978
Ratification by U.S. President December 13, 1979
U.S. ratification deposited at New York January 17, 1980

the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives held hearings, beginning in 1972, and the Senate adopted a resolution in 1973 calling for an international agreement "prohibiting the use of any environmental or geophysical modification activity as a weapon of war...."

In response to this resolution, the President ordered the Department of Defense to undertake an in-depth review of the military aspects of weather and other environmental modification techniques. The results of this study and a subsequent interagency study led to the U.S. Governments decision to seek agreement with the Soviet Union to explore the possibilities of an international agreement.

"Use of environmental modification techniques for hostile purposes does not play a major role in military planning at the present time. Such techniques might be developed in the future, however, and would pose a threat of serious damage unless action was taken to prohibit their use. In July 1972 the U.S. Government renounced the use of climate modification techniques for hostile purposes, even if their development were proved to be feasible in the future."

@nt1 skipped over the first and most important passage.

 

[ahhell]

Prior to modern warfare, I'd be moderately surprised if there weren't clear correlations between weather and war. For the most part, pre modern armies essentially had war seasons. Cold Countries almost always avoided battle in winter. Most cultures avoided war during planting, harvest, and various holidays, I'm guessing battles were much more likely to occur in dry weather.

 

[Thermal]

Like screenshots, a citation and a quote is worth nothing without the reader taking the time to fact check, themselves, the citation and quotes. Unlike this book and an other public text outside of a forum. You dont get to ask a book questions. Except to yourself. It's then the readers responsibility to either stop reading, fact check themselves, or enjoy it for what it is. Which is someone else's opinion, statement, claim, or any other deliverence.

True. But that is the New Ettiquete, courtesy of the World Wide Web. Linking is so effortless that it's considered dickish not to do so, when its right in front of you. A book needs to cite its sources very clearly (nothing vague or ambiguous), doubly so for a research paper or journal article. The difference with the online world is that you can fact check on the fly, which is priceless to the multi taskers. Any article of any repute at all links its sources in-text.

{Eta: that's also the benefit of reading peer reviewed articles in journals and well reviewed books; others did the fact checking for you. It's only on something really wild that you might want to see for yourself}

Responding to a book or text with no attempt to perform one's own personal research is comparable to cavemen yelling at fire.

Eeeehhh... sometimes, depending on the book, and how believable the claims are. Dunno about everyone else, but to me, the idea is often more valuable than the facts themselves (depending on if you are reading a technical manual or a poetic historical account of something or other, where the vibe is more significant than the dry facts

 

[nt1]

Linking is so effortless that it's considered dickish not to do so

Understood. Agreed. My other thread that was deleted had another users comment about this being a gunfight and i have a paperclip. The replies in that thread were no different than my overall experience.

There's not a lot of time to link when you have a paperclip.

Providing a link is not high on a list of priorities, staring down the barrell of a gun, while holding a paperclip.

I agree with your statement. Try to consider mine.

 

[nt1]

Understood. Agreed. My other thread that was deleted had another users comment about this being a gunfight and i have a paperclip. The replies in that thread were no different than my overall experience.

There's not a lot of time to link when you have a paperclip.

Providing a link is not high on a list of priorities, staring down the barrell of a gun, while holding a paperclip.

I agree with your statement. Try to consider mine.

Also. I find it insincere that the link cant be found by anyone in the group when considered with the level of scrutiny

 

[nt1]

Did Dick really see Jane run, or was it a metaphor for the emerging women's liberation movement?

That was just used to destroy the family unit. Like welfare.

 

[bruto]

"Use of environmental modification techniques for hostile purposes does not play a major role in military planning at the present time. Such techniques might be developed in the future, however, and would pose a threat of serious damage unless action was taken to prohibit their use. In July 1972 the U.S. Government renounced the use of climate modification techniques for hostile purposes, even if their development were proved to be feasible in the future."

@nt1 skipped over the first and most important passage.

That is one important distinction, in this case suggesting a rational decision regarding something that does not yet exist. One might also note that the Louisiana legislature is said to have come up with a bill banning chemtrails, an irrational decision regarding another thing that does not exist. Neither is good evidence for the existence of the thing in question.

With regard to Melville, it's been many years since I read Moby-Dick all the way through, but I looked up a little, and am reminded that Ishmael, like Melville himself, was quite aware of the classification of cetaceans as mammals, which had long been the case, and was made official by Linnaeus, but rejects it in his own rather confused disquisition on cetology. It seems quite unlikely that Melville shared the opinion of his fictional character here.

 

[Thermal]

Also. I find it insincere that the link cant be found by anyone in the group when considered with the level of scrutiny

Every single one of us *can*, and damn well. Many of us have been doing full tilt research since before there was an internet, and are thoroughly schooled in searching. You ain't dealing with a bunch of high schoolers here.

But we do not back off on the burden of proof. It belongs to the claimant. You can't shirk your responsibilities here and expect others to do it for you. When in Rome, baby, when in Rome.

I agree with your statement.

Cool cool. Then stop backpedaling on it.

Try to consider mine.

I have. All the paperclip jabs and the rest will stop immediately when you actually *do* what you have just agreed to do.