David Strable, age 7, of Wick, Iowa, for his question:

Can a computer predict the weather?

A computer is a super adding machine that can also multiply and divide and sub¬tract. This much can be done by any educated human brain. But the computer can do it much faster. It can work out a mass of figures and have the correct answer ready in a jiffy. The answer, of course, depends on the figures it gets. And all these figures are put into the machine by the human beings who run it. A computer can only do what people order it to do. If you give it the wrong figures, press the wrong button or pull the wrong lever it will come up with the wrong answer.

It can never replace the human brain. But the computer can be a mighty handy gadget to have. For example, the weatherman makes his forecasts from masses of figures from far and near. Countless weather stations send in reports on the tempera¬ture, the wind and the air pressure. All these figures are put in place to make the weather map that shows what to expect from tomorrow's skies. A computer can sort and chart all this information in jig time, where a human brain and fingers might not get the answer to tomorrow's weather until next week, which wouldn't be much use. In fact, some weather stations already use computers to speed up their figuring.