Showing posts with label weather. Show all posts
Showing posts with label weather. Show all posts

Jul 23, 2014

Perception vs Data: Is This The Rainiest Summer Ever?

Weather report on bTV
"Oh, not again!". This is the thought that flashed through my sleepy head this morning when the weather woman stood in front of a map densely covered by small pictures of rain and lightnings. It has been very rainy summer. The never ending rain and the missing sunshine have been a major topic in the conversations for the last few months. Everyone around is sort of angry for the lost opportunities for good times outdoors. The phrases of the day are "This is the rainiest summer ever!", "There has never been such a summer before" and "I don't remember a summer like this one". It got me thinking if it really is the case or it is our perception playing tricks? I pondered on a similar question in my World Cup post where I tried to find why this tournament is considered to be a fantastic one. In contrast to the emotionally charged football tournaments, the weather perception should be relatively simple to analyze as it has been well recorder for a long time and there is hard data on it as well as there are much less factors to consider.