第一次世界大战期间,当现代科技对欧陆战场造成前所未有的破坏之时,一位名叫里维斯·弗莱·理查德森的数学家却开始着手解决预报天气的复杂难题。看似难以操作的数字天气预报,其挑战在于运用空间微分等式来模拟地球大气的环境。理查德森估计,完成这一任务需要用到64000台“计算机”(这个术语在当时指的是用计算尺来测 During the First World War, when modern science and technology caused unprecedented destruction of the continental battlefield, a mathematician named Reeves Frye Richardson began to tackle the complexities of forecasting the weather. The challenge with seemingly intractable digital weather forecasts is the use of space differential equations to simulate the Earth’s atmosphere. Richardson estimates that 64,000 “computers” will be needed to accomplish this task (the term was referring at the time to using a slide rule