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Maps distort how we see the world

unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com

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Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#81

Post by ecshafer »

eddythompson80 wrote: post #52
jgeada wrote: post #24

Every flat map projection distorts something, so every projection has to optimize some parameter and trade off other utility. I'm constantly amazed at how hung up people are on apparent size of countries. If size is your thing, use some other projection! Mercator is and remains popular because it preserves local angles and shapes, which makes it simple use this projection to navigate by rhumb lines (compass headings)…

> Every flat map projection distorts something, so every projection has to optimize some parameter and trade off other utility. I'm constantly amazed at how hung up people are on apparent size of countries. If size is your thing, use some other projection! That's the point of the post. The trade-offs between different projections are rarely discussed, considered or even mentioned outside very small cohorts because th…

The problem with these kind of posts is that they also ignore the existence of globes. No one should be surprised by the "size" of any country because globes already exist which are a pretty close to true representation.

Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#82

Post by bit_flipper »

This article doesn't touch on the actual reasons why Mercator is still in widespread use:

* It was the first widespread projection because of its practical use for nautical navigation (where it is still the best projection available), so it was easy for map makers to sell for non-nautical uses, even after "better" projections became available. And inertia is a hard thing to overcome for something considered somewhat inconsequential.

* Mercator and its cousin Web Mercator are extremely simple and fast to calculate relative to other projections. Compare the formula for Web Mercator (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_Mercator_projection#Formul...) to Equal Earth, an excellent compromise projection for general use (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Earth_projection#Formula...). Web Mercator is very easy to generate and serve tiled maps out of, Equal Earth and the like require somewhat non-trivial engineering to make serving those maps at scale to users in a web browser economical and quick.

* Preserving angles is legitimately important still for large scale (very zoomed in) road maps. Projections which preserve size can cause things like 90 degree road intersections to render at very strange angles which confuses drivers. Mercator and Web Mercator are therefore excellent choices of projection for local road navigation, which is by far the most common use of maps today for most people.

I strongly recommend folks interested in map projections to read this from Mapbox: https://www.mapbox.com/blog/adaptive-projections. Google Maps now has similar features, but both companies relied on Mercator for many years with good reasons before technology caught up and better solutions became available.

Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#83

Post by randomdata »

luxurytent wrote: post #50

The overlay of Canada on Europe is always a fun one. We moan so much here (perhaps rightfully so) about lack of public transit and reasonable infrastructure to get around, but we're also comparing a population of (just recently hit!) 40,000 and ~700,000. Orders of magnitude larger, but roughly same land area. This is why I am hugely in support of increased immigration into Canada, housing crisis aside (it'll resolve…

> We moan so much here (perhaps rightfully so) about lack of public transit and reasonable infrastructure to get around

Funny thing is that Canada used to have that public transit infrastructure, from big cities even into tiny little towns. The country was built on it!

We eventually ripped it up because it turns out people liked driving cars more. And I posit that they still do. If the will was there, it could be rebuilt, but it turns out moaning is a lot easier.

Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#84

Post by zokier »

eddythompson80 wrote: post #52
jgeada wrote: post #24

Every flat map projection distorts something, so every projection has to optimize some parameter and trade off other utility. I'm constantly amazed at how hung up people are on apparent size of countries. If size is your thing, use some other projection! Mercator is and remains popular because it preserves local angles and shapes, which makes it simple use this projection to navigate by rhumb lines (compass headings)…

> Every flat map projection distorts something, so every projection has to optimize some parameter and trade off other utility. I'm constantly amazed at how hung up people are on apparent size of countries. If size is your thing, use some other projection! That's the point of the post. The trade-offs between different projections are rarely discussed, considered or even mentioned outside very small cohorts because th…

> Out of the millions of decorative world maps on walls, kids with maps to learn the world, world maps on the news, maps used in data visualization charts etc., non of those are using the map for "navigation" yet they still use Mercator projection simply because "that's the right shape of the world" regardless of what "right" means

I question what percentage of those maps in reality are actually Mercator? I feel this is one of those strawman memes that mercator is everywhere, when in practice it feels relatively rare to actually encounter it.

Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#85

Post by TehShrike »

I bought a couple globes in the last year and am glad I did.

I bought this small one for my desk (16$): https://www.waypointgeographic.com/p/gyroglobe-antique – every so often I rotate it slightly so that I'm staring at a different part of the globe when I look below my monitor.

I bought this one for the dining room (50$): https://www.waypointgeographic.com/p/little-adventurer-globe – the kids can spin it around whenever we talk about a country.

Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#86

Post by eddythompson80 »

the_af wrote: post #66
eddythompson80 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Every flat map projection distorts something, so every projection has to optimize some parameter and trade off other utility. I'm constantly amazed at how hung up people are on apparent size of countries. If size is your thing, use some other projection! That's the point of the post. The trade-offs between different projections are rarely discussed, considered or even mentioned outside very small cohorts because th…

> Get a non-Mercator projection map and put it in your dinner room, and then see how many of your guests will comment about "so.. why is this map weird? It doesn't look right?" then tell them "every flat map projection distorts [...]" This is actually a pretty cool conversation topic during dinner. I would take the opportunity to show off. It doesn't have to be a downside. "Hey, did you know that [interesting stuff].…

yeah, I think it would be an interesting discussion topic. Especially if you could show the 6th figure from that post (the one showing the 7,500km distortion). It just depends on how you put it. OPs remarks were condescending as if the only reason to bring this up is "because of size hang ups" as oppose to "bring this up to question your own basic wrong assumptions about the world"

It's far from common knowledge or a well known fact that the only reason the World Map looks the way it looks is just an arbitrary projection type that's picked for equally arbitrary reasons. Because as I mentioned, compass navigation is hardly the only map use-case. It may have originally started that way in the 1,200s or whatever, but today we use maps for all sorts of visualizations and other things. And the assumption that "Mercator projection" is the "right" shape of the world is held by most not because they have "size hang ups" but because it's just the way it is. Just like any assumption you hold that you never question because there is no reason to question it really.

Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#88

Post by capitainenemo »

interroboink wrote: post #32
Animats wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They all do.[1] [1] https://earth.google.com/

Aside from the humor of that page failing to load for me (Firefox), I also smirk at the fact that it would still be projecting the globe onto a _flat_ screen to view it (: Something different about having an actual ball in your hands.

Hm. Page loads fine for me in Firefox. Has for years (unlike google maps itself where oddly I get blocked for their 3d mode, even when that same mode works fine on earth.google.com)

If you're on Linux, maybe check your drivers, or do webgl.force-enabled layers.acceleration.force-enabled ?

Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#89

Post by thanatos519 »

r3trohack3r wrote: post #12

One of my favorite talks by Carl Sagan talks about the geocentric conceit, and how one manifestation of that is how most civilizations tend to put themselves at the center of the map. There are certainly some good reasons to put yourself there. Most planning for your civilization that calls for a map is going to use “home” as a starting point and you’ll go “out” from there. But it’s still a fun observation. I liked t…

That's why I put this map on my kid's wall: https://www.natgeomaps.com/re-world-classic-pacific-centered

We live in Europe where the default map is Atlantic-centric so I wanted to make sure he got a different perspective.

Re: Maps distort how we see the world

#90

Post by WirelessGigabit »

randcraw wrote: post #10

There was a memorable scene from "The West Wing" on the biases imposed by most map projections, in particular, how Mercator makes North America look huge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLqC3FNNOaI

Except Mercator wasn't German.

He was born in the County of Flanders, current day East Flanders and moved to Germany at the age of 40.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerardus_Mercator

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