The idea of forecasting the weather by calculation was first dreamt of by Lewis Fry Richardson. The first edition of this book, published in 1922, set out a detailed algorithm for systematic numerical weather prediction. The method of computing atmospheric changes, which he mapped out in great detail in this book, is essentially the method used today. He was greatly ahead of his time because, before his ideas could bear fruit, advances in four critical areas were needed: better understanding of the dynamics of the atmosphere; stable computational algorithms to integrate the equations; regular...