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// January 9 [Climate Science is Still Boring] 
// Story: Silver Glow's Journal 
// by Admiral Biscuit 
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January 9

Weather Climate Science class is still boring. There aren't going to be any practical labs, although we will go on a field trip and watch people observe the weather.

Observation is important; it's part of quality control. Clouds ought to do what they're told, and weather teams should get it right. Nopony is happy when they don't, and it messes things up when they aren't, because there is a plan which needs to be followed for everypony's benefit. But it's boring. It's just a bunch of mostly unicorn-designed instruments that verify that the precipitation is falling as it should and the winds are what they are supposed to be. It's a reaction to an event.

I know that humans can predict the weather, even without being able to properly control it. Computers like mine but bigger and smarter make the predictions (before that it was the responsibility of meteorologists and before that it was old wives and farmer's almanacs). They can make clouds with airplanes and they can seed clouds with airplanes, but they can't move the clouds they want where they are needed.

They're kind of like foals in that regard. They do things, but from what I've learned so far, they don't really understand what they're doing. It's like a foal following her mother; they get the biggest cues, but miss the small ones.

I guess it's because they've been stuck on the ground until recently, they never really had the chance to understand what was going on above their heads.

It's kind of strange to think about. People have had balloons for hundreds of years, and then they invented other kinds of flying devices like airplanes and helicopters and stuff, which are all more advanced than what any pony could produce. Most of our complex flying machines are helped along by passive pegasus magic or unicorn enchantments.

They've even gone so far as to have books of rules and men in suits that work at airplane stations to make sure that the rules are followed . . . but they don't really understand all the workings of the sky. I guess because they have to be constrained in their machines, they can't feel the way that the air moves, like an invisible sea. (That's why ship crews always like to have some pegasuses as crew members; not only can they fly around and help spot stuff, but because the sea moves like the air, and a pegasus's instincts let her understand what's happening and how to safely get through it.)

I have to bite my tongue and keep my mouth shut in class. I remind myself that if an earth pony were attending a class on flowers presented by a pegasus, she would know things that her classmates simply did not understand. I know that you stick seeds in the ground and then food grows, but not much more than that. I can predict that if I plant a cucumber seed, a cucumber plant will grow from it, but I have no sense for the soil where it will prosper.

It was nice to get out of class and be outside for a little bit before my philosophy class. It's a little too hot in the classrooms because humans don't like to be cold.

We finished up learning about Socrates. I was disappointed that it got over with so quickly, but part of the reason was that although he had laid the foundations of philosophy and science, none of his writings have survived to the modern age, so nobody knows if what his friends said that he said was actually completely true.

One of the students in class thought it was odd that people would not have kept better care of his words, and the professor explained that widespread literacy was not all that common until very recently. I raised my hoof and explained how in Equestria, mandatory school education had been reserved for unicorns in big cities until a few generations ago, although anypony could go to school if they wanted to. I wanted to talk more about that, because my mom had strong opinions about mandatory schooling, but the professor said that we needed to move on.

There should be a place on campus where students can discuss things like this. Cloudsdale and Las Pegasus have famous forums where ponies can gather and discuss things, and even my hometown has one, although it is now more often used for recreation than public debate. Maybe when the weather is nicer people gather on the quad, and they just don't do it in the wintertime.

In Equestrian class, I suggested that each student ought to keep a journal to practice writing in Equestrian. The teacher thought that was a great idea, and so they're going to do that. One entry per week; that doesn’t seem like too much.

She said before class that she tries to role-play to keep things interesting. So the class pretended that they were at an Equestrian market trying to buy things for dinner. Even I was struggling for some of it, because we don't really use very many names for different pieces of meat, and eventually the teacher said that they should stick to vegetables and fruits, and that confused a lot of them who didn't know very many kinds of vegetables.

Then we decided that a more general market would be better—what the humans call a 'flea market,' where anything could be bought or sold. That got us using a lot more vocabulary, and I played along even though sometimes they'd pretend that they were buying something that nopony would be selling at a market.

The book that Aric gave me has many other stories besides the one about Socrates. I have a weekend ahead of me, and humans have chosen to take weekends off, so I don't have any classes to attend. I think I'll read more of his book, along with the FAA book. I can't do it today, though, until later, because Peggy said that she was going to take me shopping. I'm out of mane and tail shampoo, and she said it was cheaper at the market called Meijer than the student bookstore or the West Main Party Store that is within trotting distance or the Walgreens that is at the base of campus.

I learned from Silverberg's made-up story that Socrates asked lots of questions. Some of them seemed silly, but they were important to understand things. Pizarro also questioned things, but he wasn't as good at getting to the essence of a question as Socrates. But I really liked Pizarro's dedication, and sometimes his sort of abrupt method was the best method. Sometimes you had to do things without thinking about them too much.