The World to Scale overlaid on a Mercator Projection map.

[Ewan]

I hunted for a thread where I could post this and didn't really see a suitable one. So as the title says.. The World to Scale overlaid on a Mercator Projection map.



Nothing to discuss really so sorry about that, I just thought it was really interesting to see actual country sizes as opposed to the distorted ones various projections give us.

[jaybee]

.

I looked on this site...

https://www.nature.com/nature-index/...size-countries

Originally designed to be a navigator's tool, the Mercator Map Projection has for centuries been a mariner's best friend, because it represents lines of constant true direction, which means a straight line connecting any two points on the map will travel in the same direction that a compass would show.

The way it’s designed means that objects closer to the equator appear in relative scale to one another, but objects closer to the poles appear larger than they are.

In the 1980s, it became widely used in classrooms to teach geography, and until 2018, was Google's choice of map projection.

then we have these figures...

Russia — 17,098,250 km²
Canada — 9,879,750 km²
China — 9,600,013 km²
United States — 9,525,067 - 9,831,510 km²
Brazil — 8,515,770 km²
Australia — 7,741,220 km²
India — 3,287,260 km²
Argentina — 2,780,400 km²

https://worldpopulationreview.com/co...s-in-the-world

Every country actually has two different measurements of area: land area, which is the area of all the land—and only land—in a given country and total area, sometimes referred to as Country area, which includes a country's land area as well as all the area taken up by lakes, reservoirs, inland rivers, and sometimes coastal and territorial waters.

so the dark blue in the OP map is the actual size of the land mass rather than the total area of the whole country + boundary.... ?

I'm just thinking aloud.... carry on.....

[thepainterdoug]

so if we did that to our human bodies eliminating water from land, wed be a sugar cube size of solid material? am I getting this right?

[jaybee]

Posted by thepainterdoug (here)
so if we did that to our human bodies eliminating water from land, wed be a sugar cube size of solid material? am I getting this right?

ha ha yes I think so...

on the map, the drier the country the less change in the land mass and country boundary...

[Bruce G Charlton]

A fascinating and thought-provoking presentation of something I thought I already 'knew', but - it turns out - didn't really know...

[Bill Ryan]

This inspired 4 minute clip is compulsory viewing, and totally on topic:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=H3Xyz9MgDWA

[Harmony]

These videos might help to visualise how some of the mapping systems work and how they can be misleading.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=kIID5FDi2JQ

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=CPQZ7NcQ6YQ

[Ewan]

Posted by jaybee (here)
.

so the dark blue in the OP map is the actual size of the land mass rather than the total area of the whole country + boundary.... ?

I'm just thinking aloud.... carry on.....

Posted by thepainterdoug (here)
so if we did that to our human bodies eliminating water from land, wed be a sugar cube size of solid material? am I getting this right?

Umm, no, sorry guys. (Unless it is me who has totally misunderstood what I am looking at).

It has nothing to do with removing water or total area + boundary.

Yes, the dark blue on the map is the ACTUAL size of the country relative to the other countries, (also displayed at their correct size).

The only way to correctly view the world would be on a globe, there is no way to lay a sphere flat on a plane without lots of empty space that doesn't exist on the original globe. That is why all maps are 'projections', the Mercator Projection is just one kind but by far the most commonly used.

Therefore, on the projection of the map we are used to viewing the further away you are from the equator the more distortion there is relative to reality. If you look at the original image I posted you can see that pretty much everything between the two tropics are barely distorted if at all.

Try this for any further clarification.




And take a look at this link to see other types of projection.

https://www.businessinsider.com/bost...17-3?r=US&IR=T

edit: Harmony beat me to it in a much more concise way

[Johnnycomelately]

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
This inspired 4 minute clip is compulsory viewing, and totally on topic:

The actress’s character has no familiarity with a ‘globe’ map. My family had one, an old one with not-then current country borders and names, but France was there. I think this vid obfusicates the problem, if there IS one. ~8ø 😎

[jaybee]

Posted by Ewan (here)

Posted by jaybee (here)
.

so the dark blue in the OP map is the actual size of the land mass rather than the total area of the whole country + boundary.... ?

I'm just thinking aloud.... carry on.....

Posted by thepainterdoug (here)
so if we did that to our human bodies eliminating water from land, wed be a sugar cube size of solid material? am I getting this right?

Umm, no, sorry guys. (Unless it is me who has totally misunderstood what I am looking at).

It has nothing to do with removing water or total area + boundary.

Yes, the dark blue on the map is the ACTUAL size of the country relative to the other countries, (also displayed at their correct size).

The only way to correctly view the world would be on a globe, there is no way to lay a sphere flat on a plane without lots of empty space that doesn't exist on the original globe. That is why all maps are 'projections', the Mercator Projection is just one kind but by far the most commonly used.

Therefore, on the projection of the map we are used to viewing the further away you are from the equator the more distortion there is relative to reality. If you look at the original image I posted you can see that pretty much everything between the two tropics are barely distorted if at all.

Ok thanks -

I think I had a bit of a shock because although I would expect some tinkering to make a flat map from a sphere - I hadn't seen the big difference in sizes shown in your opening post before -

I was.....

[O Donna]

Posted by Harmony (here)
These videos might help to visualise how some of the mapping systems work and how they can be misleading.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=kIID5FDi2JQ

Eternal dilemma of map makers. The surface of a sphere cannot be represented as a plane without some form of distortion.

This goes so much further than geographical mapping into realms such as 'mind mapping'. Complex ideologies are often mapped and if not careful during the mapping process it can be forgotten that there are more than 1, 2 or 3 dimensions.

Steering it back to geography, its interesting to reflect how our distorted indoctrination in the world of geography can stick with us our whole life, never changing. Well, unless we "seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no man has gone before!". It is but another example as to why we should never settle for 'expert' indoctrination as the final word. The final worldview as it were.

[Ewan]

Posted by O Donna (here)
This goes so much further than geographical mapping into realms such as 'mind mapping'. Complex ideologies are often mapped and if not careful during the mapping process it can be forgotten that there are more than 1, 2 or 3 dimensions.

Steering it back to geography, its interesting to reflect how our distorted indoctrination in the world of geography can stick with us our whole life, never changing. Well, unless we "seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no man has gone before!". It is but another example as to why we should never settle for 'expert' indoctrination as the final word. The final worldview as it were.

Woah!, you just took this to a whole new level. I'm honestly gobsmacked that this thread has attracted so much response, I genuinely thought there was nothing to discuss.

Whilst I fully support your final statements about never settling for expert opinion, (indoctrinations), taking it up to the level of dimensional thinking .. um ... you know .....

...actually...

...thank you for that, that really expanded the topic to the way we view things.

Through our continued exposure to 'this is the way things are' we lose all sense of what is actually real. Or may be real, I suspect each layer of reality dissolves as we realise more. (Or should that be unrealise!). Language is fascinating - by realising something do we make it more real?

No, we are increasing our understanding.

Understanding - under - standing?

Under = beneath, below.

Standing = upright, not inclined?

Understanding might equate to foundation? A foundation for thinking?

So if that were true? Realising something actually means the opposite of what we generally take it to mean.

I hate language, it cannot convey thought!!!

(I'm outta here, I know what I am trying to impart and suspect I am failing, miserably. My football team, (soccer), won today and have moved up to third in the league and I just got back from the pub. Ergo I am a tad more loquacious than usual and I talk too much!)

See you tomorrow.

PS: I know sport is 'bread and circuses' and winning/losing is nothing but emotion. Entire thing is a distraction ~ but jeez, sometimes I need a break!

[wondering]

I find this fascinating but am totally not understanding it. The variations of the same countries in the OP are quite surprising to me....I hope to understand more as the thread goes on.

[Matthew]

Posted by wondering (here)
I find this fascinating but am totally not understanding it. The variations of the same countries in the OP are quite surprising to me....I hope to understand more as the thread goes on.

The word projection is a bit technical. If I understand right "stretching" is a type of projection, so the bottom line: they are literally stretching the truth! They're not meant to stretch the picture so it changes the shape of the image.

From Ewan's post above:

[Mark (Star Mariner)]

Had a Mercator world map on my wall as a kid. In fact one of my favourite books back then (for a while) was an Atlas. I still have my Times Atlas of the World, which is gigantic and weighs a ton. It's from the mid 80s though and very out of date.

A rule of thumb I knew then for judging the true sizes of the countries is that Russia is approximately the same size/dimension as the United States but twice as wide.

You can see for yourself at this interesting site, where you can drag countries over each other to see the true scale:

https://www.thetruesize.com

And you can also study this:

(large)