Talk:Tempest prognosticator

April Fools
Hmm... april 1st eh? Hazza 14:20, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

This definately has to be an April Fool's joke. Almost had me! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chokosabe (talk • contribs) 2007-04-01 16:28:37
 * Nope, totally true, On wikipedia our april fools joke is that our 'joke' material is actually completely true, although totally weird. --Gmaxwell 17:14, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Excellent! Gotcha!  This article is indeed 100% true - but just flakey enough to convince people it's an april fool joke. SteveBaker 23:02, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm rather happy with how this worked out! violet/riga (t) 15:55, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Unusual honour
This article must be the only one I have ever come across that appeared on DYK more than two weeks after failing the FAC process! violet/riga (t) 07:08, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Leech survival
I don't understand how the leeches survive in this? Surely they would starve to death, thus requiring the continuous replacement of the leeches with new ones? Or would the owner of the prognosticator have to feed them occasionally by putting them on his body? It would be nice if the article made that clear.  howcheng  {chat} 18:05, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Interesting points. I've not seen any sources that discuss this and could only guess at the answer.  I would assume that leeches were somewhat more available back in the day (due to their medical usage) and that Merryweather would replace them when needed.  I wouldn't have thought that the device was in continual usage, at least not for a significant length of time.  violet/riga (t) 20:00, 3 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Sadly, you may well have hit on the reason why we do not all have Tempest Prognosticators in our living rooms. Not all inventions pan out in the face of real world practicalities!  Leeches can probably survive a long time without a meal - we humans get cranky if we don't eat every few hours - but cockroaches can go for a year without eating - crocodiles manage quite well for six months without food.  Perhaps leeches can also survive for long enough to make changing them out no worse than swapping out the batteries on your MP3 player.  But I think it's obvious from the article that this was never a practical machine. SteveBaker (talk) 20:33, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Neutral point of view check
As a 19th century weather prediction device based on rather dubious principles, I would expect this not to work any better than chance. However, the article contains numerous statements that seem to imply that it does work, and the "accuracy and success" section only reports on Merryweather's original 19th century findings, without mentioning any more modern study or opinions by modern scientists. I'm adding the "POV check" template to request that the article be reworked to present 19th century claims about the device as 19th century claims rather than facts. If such studies exist, it would be helpful to report on more modern studies of the device's effectiveness. Nathaniel Virgo (talk) 14:13, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

External links modified (January 2018)
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20011224020409/http://www.magma.ca/~jdreid/leech.htm to http://www.magma.ca/~jdreid/leech.htm
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080517045232/http://www.scholars.nus.edu.sg/landow/victorian/technology/packer/merryweather.html to http://www.scholars.nus.edu.sg/landow/victorian/technology/packer/merryweather.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20070309175537/http://www.whitbymuseum.org.uk/d12/misc/index.htm to http://www.whitbymuseum.org.uk/d12/misc/index.htm

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