"Mercator's map takes the Earth's latitudes and longitudes (parallels and meridians) which curve around the spherical globe and makes them straight lines. This allowed sailors to plot a course between any two points using a straight line, but it also created distortions in the map the further you got from the equator. For example, Greenland appears roughly the same size as the continent of Africa on a Mercator map, even though Africa is about 14 times larger."
"Turns out, it depends on the map. Though globes offer a pretty accurate picture of the world's geography, things get a lot trickier when you try to depict a sphere on a two-dimensional surface. The shapes and sizes of land masses can get distorted, and distances and directions risk becoming wonky. There are many different types of world maps, and each one has its strengths and weaknesses."
"President Trump is again floating the idea of annexing Greenland, the semiautonomous Arctic island that is a territory of Denmark. Greenland's location between North America and Russia gives it strategic value for the U.S., which already has a military base there. "We do need Greenland, absolutely," Trump said on Sunday. "We need it for defense." If all this talk makes you want to check out Greenland on a map, you might notice its size. Greenland is the world's largest island,"
President Trump renewed talk of annexing Greenland, citing defense and its strategic position between North America and Russia and noting an existing U.S. military base. Greenland is the world's largest island, but apparent size varies depending on map projection. Flat maps must convert the globe to two dimensions, which can distort shapes, sizes, distances and directions. The Mercator projection straightens latitude and longitude lines to aid navigation, and that stretching inflates areas near the poles. As a result, Greenland can look comparable in size to Africa on some maps despite Africa being far larger.
Read at www.npr.org
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]