climate Review A Short Critical History on the Development of Meteorology and Climatology Gustavo Zen de Figueiredo Neves 1,*, Nuria Pérez Gallardo 1 and Francisco Arthur da Silva Vecchia 2 1 Graduate Program in Environmental Engineering Sciences, University of São Paulo (USP) at the São Carlos School of Engineering, 400 Trabalhador Saocarlense Avenue, 13566-590 São Carlos, SP, Brazil;
[email protected] 2 Department of Hidrology and Sanitation, University of São Paulo (USP) at the São Carlos School of Engineering, Graduate Program in Environmental Engineering Sciences, 400 Trabalhador Saocarlense Avenue, 13566-590 São Carlos, SP, Brazil;
[email protected] * Correspondence:
[email protected]; Tel.: +55-16-3373-8256 Academic Editors: Valdir Adilson Steinke and Charlei Aparecido da Silva Received: 27 December 2016; Accepted: 7 March 2017; Published: 9 March 2017 Abstract: The present study presents a brief discussion regarding the evolution of meteorology from the sixteenth to the twenty-first century, throughout antiquitiy, Aristotle’s legacy, and contemporaneity. Part of the text is dedicated to illustrating the emergence of Brazilian climatology and a new paradigm, postulating physical geography and the French School of Climatology and Meteorology. Keywords: atmospheric sciences; geography; Brazilian climatology; climatic rythm; weather 1. Introduction The present paper shows a timeline of the last four centuries of studies on the history of meteorology and climatology as a science and its importance in regards to other advances in the atmospheric sciences, based on English literature. The retrospective study of the concept of types of weather, which has undergone the evolution of meteorological instruments, and the resulting atomization of meteorological weather, regarding its constituent elements, structuring and consolidation of the networks of weather stations, and the construction of hypotheses and concepts, aim to understand and study the atmosphere.