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This map is not upside down

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Re: This map is not upside down

#271

Post by MangoToupe »

hyperhello wrote: post #2

> Psychologically, we tend to view things nearer the top as ‘good’ and those lower as ‘bad.’ This, of course, is the point of the article. It was so predictable that it made me wonder: who is telling me that top is good and lower is bad? The articles themselves.

Out of curiosity, why do you think humanity tends to read from top down? We do have inherent bias living in a world with gravity. Though such bias may be subtle, and any attempts to evince deep meaning futile, it is nevertheless present.

Re: This map is not upside down

#272

Post by shpx »

jama211 wrote: post #115
ks2048 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure it’s arbitrary. For one, starting at the top and ending at the bottom is natural progress of things because of gravity. I’m not sure if that means anything, but down-to-up seems very unnatural (of coure I can’t ignore my cultural biases). Is there any writing systems like that?

Gravity is just a random natural process to pick for your point. You could just as easily say “bottom to top is natural because that’s the direction trees grow”. It’s all arbitrary.

I don't think "natural" is used metaphorically. If you had an accurate simulation of the human hand you could show that one of the directions minimizes energy usage and damage to your hand, and I think it's the one we use. Starting high means gravity is helping you move down the page, and it's also easier to move your hand towards you than away from you, and the many small movements (rather than the one big one to the top of the next page) are where more energy is spent because of friction.

Writing is done by people and people are almost always subject to gravity. It's one of the 4 fundamental forces. Energy minimization is not an arbitrary selection criteria, it's central to the fitness/design of all living things.

Re: This map is not upside down

#273

Post by travisjungroth »

whstl wrote: post #186
patternMachine wrote: post #48

The moralizing that always accompanies (not) upside down maps is so tedious. It's a genuinely interesting example of how something can look so wrong and yet not be wrong at all. To try to extend that "wrong" feeling to some kind of moral failure on the viewers part is just silly. You (or society) are not a bad or prejudiced person for thinking this way, it's just that nearly all maps produced have chosen a different…

As someone from the southern hemisphere, the only thing more patronizing and infuriating than this is the insistence from the same moralizing group that my country isn’t part of “The West”, despite it being physically and culturally there.

The West only makes sense in the Northern Hemisphere. I’m in Peru right now, and people talk about the local cultures in comparison to Western culture and I find it kind of confusing. They’re certainly not Eastern here.

It gets unconfusing if you realize it just means White.

Re: This map is not upside down

#274

Post by travisjungroth »

MrZander wrote: post #149
maxglute wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Split it at the equator, make them north south edges and make everyone angry.

It hurts my head to even try to visualize this

It’s because to make it work you split just half the equator. Think of the prime meridian and the antimeridian (by the date line). They make a circle that goes all the way around like the equator, but you only split on half.

Re: This map is not upside down

#275

Post by freefrog334433 »

simonh wrote: post #267
Legend2440 wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China has had massive economic growth in recent years, but were undisputedly a developing country prior to that growth. They may deserve to be reclassified now, although their GDP per capita is still much lower than the US.

Only because their population is so huge. Their Dollar GDP is about 2/3 that of the USA and is 4.5x that of Japan. In a sense it’s set of highly developed urban industrial zones that also has a massive underdeveloped rural area.

GDP PPP is being used to compare countries productivity more often now. Australia has high GDP but low productivity as most is sunk into expensive, unproductive real estate. Every country has their rust belts and undeveloped rural areas.

Re: This map is not upside down

#276

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

bluGill wrote: post #56
throw-the-towel wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also in the address department: Europe numbers houses roughly sequentially along the whole street, while the Americas (generally) assign house numbers based on the distance to the beginning of the block. And BTW, in the old towns of Sweden and Finland blocks do have names!

Sometimes. I know of places in america where numbers are sequential. I know of other places where they a sequential but increase by five.

I grew up in a neighborhood where they were numbered by the order the lots were sold. Completely random madness the poor postman has to deal with.

Re: This map is not upside down

#277

Post by Arch485 »

navane wrote: post #144
schoen wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At one point a character in Eco's Foucault's Pendulum says "archetypes don't exist, the body exists" and then gives some sexual and reproductive examples, followed by > And high is better than low, because if you have your head down, the blood goes to your brain, because feet stink and hair doesn’t stink as much, because it’s better to climb a tree and pick fruit than end up underground, food for worms, and because y…

We print black on white. Does that mean that words are bad and only defile the blank sheet?

Sounds like a new religion in the making!

Re: This map is not upside down

#278

Post by idkfasayer »

shirro wrote: post #258

The thing I resent most is the terms Global North and Global South. It seems like an offensive classification no matter which side you are placed. China is an incredibly rich, highly developed industrial economy with a history that goes back thousands of years with massive cultural influence. They are firmly in the northern hemisphere. They have high speed electric trains and their cities look like something out of B…

How about East - West?

https://m.xkcd.com/503/

Re: This map is not upside down

#279

Post by thelibrarian »

pac0 wrote: post #261
BaardFigur wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Casually claiming a bunch of British territories

Islas Malvinas are Argentinian.

Argentina has tried to prove this both by legal means and by force, and has conclusively failed at both, so I think it's well past time to give up.

Re: This map is not upside down

#280

Post by thelibrarian »

While the orientation is interesting, the coloring is very poor. With no key, it would seem that the colors are used to differentiate countries, but they have too many adjacent countries colored the same default beige. This makes Canada, Greenland and Iceland all appear to be the same country, likewise with Australia, New Zealand, and Papua New Guinea. Also Mexico and most of the Caribbean (except Haiti).
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