In the first full-length study in any modern language dedicated to the Meteorologica, Malcolm Wilson presents a groundbreaking interpretation of Aristotle's natural philosophy. Divided into two parts, the book first addresses general philosophical and scientific issues by placing the treatise in a diachronic frame comprising Aristotle's predecessors and in a synchronic frame comprising his other physical works. It argues that Aristotle thought of meteorological phenomena as intermediary or 'dualizing' between the cosmos as a whole and the manifold world of terrestrial animals. Engaging with the best current literature on Aristotle's theories of science and metaphysics, Wilson focuses on issues of aetiology, teleology and the structure and unity of science. The second half of the book illustrates Aristotle's principal concerns in a section-by-section treatment of the meteorological phenomena and provides solutions to many of the problems that have been raised since the time of the ancient commentators.

This book concentrates on the meteorological aspects of Aristotle’s work published as Meteorologica books A-D, and on how they compare now with our understanding of meteorology and climate change.

An account of what Arabic scholars have written, either as commentators or as more independent authors, on the subjects treated in Aristotle's Meteorology, this work investigates how they were influenced by one another and by previous Greek commentators. For each subject a survey is given of the content of the Greek commentaries (by Alexander, Philoponus and Olympiodorus) as well as of a later treatise, ascribed to Olympiodorus and extant only in Arabic. Then, the Arabic version of Ibn al-Bitrīq is investigated; it was one of the sources used by the Arabic writers which are discussed after that: al-Kindī, Ibn Sīnā and later scholars who were inspired by him, Ibn Bājja and Ibn Rušd. Two Arabic treatises on subjects from the Meteorology are edited and translated.

This book is dedicated to the atmosphere of our planet, and discusses historical and contemporary achievements in meteorological science and technology for the betterment of society. The book explores many significant atmospheric phenomena and physical processes from the local to global scale, as well as from the perspective of short and long-term time scales, and links these processes to various applications in other scientific disciplines with linkages to meteorology. In addition to addressing general topics such as climate system dynamics and climate change, the book also discusses atmospheric boundary layer, atmospheric waves, atmospheric chemistry, optics/photometeors, electricity, atmospheric modeling and numeric weather prediction. Through its interdisciplinary approach, the book will be of interest to researchers, students and academics in meteorology and atmospheric science, environmental physics, climate change dynamics, air pollution and human health impacts of atmospheric aerosols.