WEBVTT - SYSK Selects: How Maps Work 0:00:00.640 --> 0:00:03.600 Hi, everybody, This is Chuck again with another edition of 0:00:03.800 --> 0:00:08.840 Stuff you Should Know. Selects are Saturday Classic Edition episodes 0:00:09.320 --> 0:00:11.920 and uh, as you know, we're curating these one at 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:14.400 a time, and this week I got to pick, and 0:00:14.440 --> 0:00:17.319 I picked How Maps Work? And uh I picked this 0:00:17.360 --> 0:00:19.800 one because everyone knows I love maps, and so I 0:00:19.840 --> 0:00:21.400 thought it was a good one to rerun. Plus I 0:00:21.400 --> 0:00:23.200 get to talk a little bit about my old high 0:00:23.239 --> 0:00:26.480 school best friend Rad, who was a cartographer and I'm 0:00:26.520 --> 0:00:28.360 always happy to get the word out about his work. 0:00:28.440 --> 0:00:33.800 So listen and enjoy. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know 0:00:34.440 --> 0:00:42.519 from House Stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to 0:00:42.560 --> 0:00:45.559 the podcast. I'm Josh Clarkin, There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, 0:00:45.920 --> 0:00:48.600 and I just had a bunch of peanuts. So it's 0:00:48.600 --> 0:00:53.080 Stuff you Know Time Circus Edition. Yep. I wonder if 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:55.120 we could get R. E. M. S. Maps and Legends 0:00:55.160 --> 0:00:59.640 to play just subtly behind this entire podcast. I can 0:00:59.680 --> 0:01:05.240 answer that for you. Nope, No, okay, what album is 0:01:05.280 --> 0:01:08.039 that one? Where is that an album? Boy? That was 0:01:08.080 --> 0:01:14.120 the early one? I think maybe like reckoning even No again, 0:01:14.160 --> 0:01:17.240 people are at home screaming at me because I can't 0:01:17.280 --> 0:01:19.880 call that to mind. Was that their first one reckoning 0:01:21.040 --> 0:01:24.560 Let's just move on. I'm afraid to get anything wrong. Yeah, 0:01:24.600 --> 0:01:27.240 it's cool. People who are in are um are really 0:01:27.280 --> 0:01:31.320 in ari em maps and legends. Good song um chuck. Yeah. 0:01:31.440 --> 0:01:34.960 Have you ever used a map? Um? I have? I 0:01:35.000 --> 0:01:40.320 am a notoriously terrible with my sense of direction, like 0:01:40.840 --> 0:01:45.440 literally almost all the time. If I say it's left, 0:01:45.480 --> 0:01:48.560 isn't it? They say, no, it's right. We just talked 0:01:48.600 --> 0:01:50.880 about this. And because if I try to trick myself 0:01:50.880 --> 0:01:52.320 and go I think it's left, I'm gonna say right, 0:01:52.360 --> 0:01:55.760 then it's left. Like it's terrible. I've talked about it before. 0:01:55.840 --> 0:01:58.320 It's it's really yeah, we we did recently. I can't 0:01:58.360 --> 0:02:00.880 place why or where. It's just my brain. Man, it 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:03.120 doesn't work that way. So yeah, I use maps, and 0:02:03.160 --> 0:02:05.080 I'm one of those people as to turn the map 0:02:05.120 --> 0:02:08.240 in the direction I'm facing, and I just it's tough 0:02:08.280 --> 0:02:12.200 for me. So when you were using a map, you 0:02:12.240 --> 0:02:16.360 could have also said or that you're terrible using maps. 0:02:16.400 --> 0:02:22.080 You can say I'm terrible at using two dimensional um contorted, 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:31.320 grossly misrepresentative images that supposedly are um. They stand for 0:02:31.919 --> 0:02:36.560 different data points of Earth. That's right, that's another way 0:02:36.560 --> 0:02:39.480 you could put maps, because it turns out that they're 0:02:39.480 --> 0:02:44.480 actually not so great, even though they are extraordinarily useful. 0:02:45.160 --> 0:02:47.839 They're portable now that you can get them online, they're 0:02:47.840 --> 0:02:50.600 more portable than ever, and we would be pretty much 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:54.160 nowhere without them as far as the imperial colonization of 0:02:54.160 --> 0:02:58.520 the world went. But um, we still have not licked 0:02:58.560 --> 0:03:02.680 some very fundamental sick problems with maps. Maps and legends 0:03:02.760 --> 0:03:05.720 was on fables By the way, So did you didn't 0:03:05.720 --> 0:03:07.480 even hear what I just said? I heard it all 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:13.960 and I agree. Well, the problem is, dude, is the 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:16.840 Earth is is not a flat piece of paper or 0:03:16.840 --> 0:03:20.880 a computer screen. The Earth is uh sort of shape 0:03:20.919 --> 0:03:24.359 like a pumpkin. Yeah, I didn't realize that. I didn't either. 0:03:24.480 --> 0:03:26.680 Apparently the middle is getting bigger too. You know what, 0:03:26.800 --> 0:03:29.680 I just realized what what Tracy who wrote this meant 0:03:29.680 --> 0:03:35.560 by pumpkin? Like, she didn't mean the tall pumpkin. Well, yeah, 0:03:35.600 --> 0:03:38.680 pumpkins come in all shapes, right, So which pumpkin was 0:03:38.720 --> 0:03:43.640 she referring to? I think like the shorter, rounder, round pumpkin. Yeah, 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:47.040 but apparently I think the Earth is supposedly getting bigger, 0:03:47.360 --> 0:03:51.600 expanding at its at its center, not in the center, 0:03:51.640 --> 0:03:56.120 but it's getting more pumpkiny, I think more pumpkin like. Okay, 0:03:56.120 --> 0:03:59.320 so maps are getting less and less accurate then maybe 0:03:59.440 --> 0:04:01.640 because here here's the problem. Map, Like we said, it's 0:04:01.640 --> 0:04:04.920 a two dimensional representation of something that's three dimensional. It's 0:04:04.960 --> 0:04:08.360 hard to do. A map is flat and it's representing 0:04:08.400 --> 0:04:12.080 something that's round, spherical. Um. And if you take like, 0:04:12.200 --> 0:04:14.960 take a pumpkin, go to your pantry right now and 0:04:15.040 --> 0:04:17.920 get one of the pumpkins that you have there, and 0:04:18.000 --> 0:04:21.160 take a piece of paper off of a roll saying 0:04:21.240 --> 0:04:24.120 newsprint and um, tear enough off to go all the 0:04:24.120 --> 0:04:27.040 way around the pumpkin, and you will see that if 0:04:27.080 --> 0:04:30.679 you if you take a pumpkin and mash the paper 0:04:30.720 --> 0:04:34.880 around it so that the pumpkins completely covered, you're gonna 0:04:34.920 --> 0:04:39.720 have something that's that's just grossly distorted. That's a map. 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:42.680 It's a gross distortion of what's real. So much so 0:04:42.800 --> 0:04:46.400 that if you see a map that accurately represents what 0:04:46.440 --> 0:04:48.760 the continents look like and how close they are and 0:04:49.040 --> 0:04:52.640 the amount of size they each have, you'd probably be 0:04:52.680 --> 0:04:55.000 pretty startled because it doesn't look like what we're used to, 0:04:55.040 --> 0:05:00.440 which is called the ma cat projection. Yeah. Um, And 0:05:00.560 --> 0:05:02.520 it's funny. When I was reading this, I remember thinking 0:05:02.520 --> 0:05:05.200 to myself, like, you know, if you're gonna make cheats, 0:05:05.240 --> 0:05:07.640 like make them in the ocean, and I think that's 0:05:07.680 --> 0:05:09.760 a lot of times what they do. Yeah, these no 0:05:09.800 --> 0:05:16.040 one would notice, you know, the good hommal homal design. 0:05:16.680 --> 0:05:20.800 The good homal design good as in somebody's last name 0:05:20.839 --> 0:05:25.440 with an e. It basically distorts or chops up the 0:05:25.440 --> 0:05:29.080 world in the oceans, so it's real good for land mass. 0:05:29.279 --> 0:05:31.640 It would be terrible if you're driving like a an 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:34.400 oil tanker across the sea. Yeah. You don't want to 0:05:34.720 --> 0:05:38.159 navigate by these things. No. And so since there's different 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:41.560 ways to distort a map, there's different uses for different 0:05:41.600 --> 0:05:45.520 types of maps or distortions, which we call projections. We'll 0:05:45.560 --> 0:05:47.599 get into that a little more later on. Let's talk 0:05:47.640 --> 0:05:51.760 about the basics of all maps, right. A map is 0:05:51.839 --> 0:05:57.120 essentially a representation of, like we said, data points on Earth. Yeah, 0:05:57.120 --> 0:06:00.360 and it can be it can represent whatever. There's different 0:06:00.360 --> 0:06:03.559 attributes you can if you wanted to show a map 0:06:03.839 --> 0:06:10.760 um distribution of UM Golden Retriever ownership, you could do 0:06:10.839 --> 0:06:13.359 that on a map. You totally could. Or the GDP 0:06:13.480 --> 0:06:17.760 of different countries or land use you know, like it's 0:06:17.800 --> 0:06:21.359 basically an easy way. It's an easy language to show 0:06:21.400 --> 0:06:27.359 someone in picture form, various attributes, you know, and uh, 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:31.279 maps are created by people called cartographers, which is great 0:06:32.000 --> 0:06:34.919 and um, like we said there's some there's some basic 0:06:35.040 --> 0:06:37.800 commonalities to all maps, right, yeah. I kind of collect 0:06:37.839 --> 0:06:40.080 maps by the way. I know you told me, not 0:06:40.160 --> 0:06:42.960 like a bunch, but I've got I've got like six 0:06:43.040 --> 0:06:46.360 right maps, any pirate maps, no pirate maps, but my 0:06:46.160 --> 0:06:49.760 my entire desk. I made my desk and it is, Uh, 0:06:49.920 --> 0:06:51.680 I've got a map of the world on it. It's like, 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:54.320 you know, four ft by three feet and then I 0:06:54.320 --> 0:06:56.320 shall act over that and that's like my you know, 0:06:56.400 --> 0:06:59.200 the base of my desk. Yeah, it's really cool because 0:06:59.200 --> 0:07:02.279 you know, i'd reference it a lot. Actually, I like 0:07:02.440 --> 0:07:05.440 the uh yeah, you know I could stand to do 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:09.760 that a lot more New England no idea. Well, it's 0:07:09.760 --> 0:07:11.400 like looking up a word in the dictionary when you 0:07:11.440 --> 0:07:14.000 don't know it referring to an atlas. If you're like, hey, 0:07:14.000 --> 0:07:16.840 where's Kuala Lampoor but I don't have a map, and suddenly, 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:21.040 oh my god, Miss teen South Carolina's answer has come 0:07:21.080 --> 0:07:23.840 to pass like I don't have a map, and I'm 0:07:23.840 --> 0:07:26.760 not I'm not bad with maps, and I think if 0:07:26.800 --> 0:07:28.800 you gave me like a little time, I would be 0:07:28.880 --> 0:07:33.400 able to find anything. Sure, but um, because I don't 0:07:33.440 --> 0:07:36.360 have a map for easy reference, like I use online 0:07:36.360 --> 0:07:40.680 maps now, but like if I had one for easy reference, 0:07:40.720 --> 0:07:42.520 I think I would be a lot better at geography. 0:07:42.560 --> 0:07:46.120 I think everybody forget your computer. That's very handy, but 0:07:46.160 --> 0:07:48.480 I think everyone should own a globe and or a 0:07:48.520 --> 0:07:51.040 map of the world just to have it right. It's 0:07:51.120 --> 0:07:52.800 nice to have frame it, put it on your wall. 0:07:53.240 --> 0:07:57.000 They're very attractive. It's art, all right. I like the 0:07:57.040 --> 0:08:02.400 fifties sixties maps, like a kind you'd find at school. Yeah, 0:08:02.400 --> 0:08:04.600 from that era. I just like the design of them 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:08.520 to look Yeah, Kevin Canaine that one of the comedians 0:08:08.520 --> 0:08:11.480 I saw, Max fun was talking about his pillows and 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:13.920 how you unsheathed his pillow, how nasty it is and 0:08:13.960 --> 0:08:16.160 it looks like an ancient map of the world. You know, 0:08:16.200 --> 0:08:18.360 it's like brown with those like lines. Yeah, what is 0:08:18.400 --> 0:08:21.480 that stuff? It's he basically is like you know, this 0:08:21.520 --> 0:08:25.360 stuff is like leaks from your head like sleep. Uh, 0:08:25.440 --> 0:08:27.720 it's funny. It's a funny bit. Okay, so the basic 0:08:27.760 --> 0:08:31.720 commonalities of maps are number one, usually land masses or 0:08:31.840 --> 0:08:34.640 bodies of water. So you're gonna have an outline of 0:08:34.679 --> 0:08:37.840 what you're talking about or what you're trying to show. Yeah, um, 0:08:38.559 --> 0:08:41.680 are you talking about like a physical map? Yeah, well, 0:08:41.720 --> 0:08:43.160 I mean any map is going to have that, but 0:08:43.559 --> 0:08:47.400 the physical map is physical maps are more like like 0:08:47.480 --> 0:08:50.520 the terrain of an area, right, that's what a physical 0:08:50.520 --> 0:08:54.280 maps concerned with. Yeah, and they use something called hipsometric 0:08:54.320 --> 0:08:59.280 tents um variations of color to obviously, you know, usually 0:08:59.280 --> 0:09:01.280 your water is blue and then the land can be 0:09:01.320 --> 0:09:05.679 green to brown or white if it's like the Swiss Alps, 0:09:05.679 --> 0:09:07.600 you know. Yeah, have you ever seen a map where 0:09:07.600 --> 0:09:10.000 the water isn't blue? The one on my desk is 0:09:10.440 --> 0:09:15.040 it's tan. What Yeah, it's the whole thing is reading 0:09:15.040 --> 0:09:19.320 in background. Now there's no blue, it's all tan. Um, Yeah, 0:09:19.440 --> 0:09:22.320 it's tan. I've never seen that, you know, like the 0:09:22.360 --> 0:09:26.000 Tan globe. No, you've seen like the Tan globe where 0:09:26.040 --> 0:09:28.640 the globe isn't like blue and green. That's basically what 0:09:28.679 --> 0:09:31.960 this is. It's like, I'm still having trouble wrapping my 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:34.480 head around it. Next time you're in my home office, 0:09:34.520 --> 0:09:38.240 I'll show it to you. Uh. You can have political 0:09:38.320 --> 0:09:43.360 maps that display like different cultural information about countries. Um. 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:47.480 Thematic maps obviously have a theme like climate or g 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:50.280 DP like I said, or you can get really specialized 0:09:50.320 --> 0:09:53.280 like hey, where's the internet available in the world. Let's 0:09:53.360 --> 0:09:55.320 draw a map instead of listing a bunch of countries. 0:09:56.200 --> 0:10:01.800 Got you know? Yeah? Um yeah, thematic maps those are 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:05.000 probably the ones you see the most, aside from using 0:10:05.080 --> 0:10:07.880 a map for street directions. Yeah, thematic maps are the 0:10:07.880 --> 0:10:10.360 ones you went across. Like it'll be all sorts of 0:10:10.360 --> 0:10:14.080 things like you just mentioned population density or oil exports, 0:10:14.080 --> 0:10:17.480 all that. All right, Josh, Let's talk about what they 0:10:17.640 --> 0:10:21.520 call cartography conventions. And this is not when a bunch 0:10:21.520 --> 0:10:26.679 of cartographers get together at you know, the the downtown 0:10:26.760 --> 0:10:30.040 Hilton in Atlanta and talk about maps, although I'm sure 0:10:30.040 --> 0:10:33.160 they do that. I'm sure there are real cartography conventions. 0:10:33.720 --> 0:10:37.160 We're talking about conventions in the sense of often used 0:10:37.640 --> 0:10:42.280 uh techniques, right. Um. One of them, which I have 0:10:42.360 --> 0:10:45.320 already broken with my map, is that, like we said, 0:10:45.360 --> 0:10:50.160 water is blue. That's so weird. I don't understand land 0:10:50.200 --> 0:10:53.319 is screen vegetation screen or brown or tan land masses 0:10:53.640 --> 0:10:55.840 that's just one of the comic conventions. So what color 0:10:55.960 --> 0:10:57.960 is the land mask? Then if the water on your 0:10:58.000 --> 0:11:02.640 map is tan, they're also uh tan and green and 0:11:02.640 --> 0:11:06.280 and brown and yeah, I don't know what you're talking about. 0:11:06.600 --> 0:11:08.360 It's really not that big of a deal, you know. 0:11:08.440 --> 0:11:10.400 I'll go look it up. I will post a photo 0:11:11.040 --> 0:11:15.800 of this of my map um online on Facebook when 0:11:15.840 --> 0:11:17.800 we do this, and everyone will go, oh, that doesn't 0:11:17.800 --> 0:11:21.400 look so weird. All right. I feel like a jerk 0:11:21.440 --> 0:11:24.200 now because my water is not blue. No, No, it's fine, Okay, 0:11:24.320 --> 0:11:28.640 I'm just I'm just having trouble understand you. It's all yeah, um, 0:11:28.679 --> 0:11:32.880 all maps to pick their subject matter from above. Yeah, 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:35.040 that's something that you just don't even really think of. 0:11:35.080 --> 0:11:40.079 It's such a common convention. North is usually at the top, yeah, um, generally, 0:11:40.160 --> 0:11:42.160 or if it's not, for some reason, they'll point you 0:11:42.160 --> 0:11:44.480 in the right direction, say this is north, this is 0:11:44.559 --> 0:11:48.800 southeast and west. They have legends a lot of times. Yeah, 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:50.959 maps and legends. Like we talked about with r a 0:11:51.160 --> 0:11:54.040 M and UM scale is usually indicated, so like it 0:11:54.040 --> 0:11:56.400 will be like one inch equals a hundred miles, or 0:11:56.440 --> 0:11:59.559 there's like one to like there's a ratio or something 0:11:59.600 --> 0:12:01.760 like that. Yeah, and this is all the the gobbity 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:04.200 book you find on the outskirts of the map. There's 0:12:04.280 --> 0:12:06.120 usually lots of stuff written down that you may not 0:12:06.200 --> 0:12:08.520 look at. That's where you'll find this information. And this 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:11.880 should include in the legend that like Hawaii and Alaska 0:12:11.960 --> 0:12:16.120 are not actually right next to one another in the 0:12:16.160 --> 0:12:20.800 South Pacific Ocean. Yeah, as it seems it's true. That's 0:12:20.840 --> 0:12:23.920 just odd. Well, like we said, it's tough, you know, 0:12:23.920 --> 0:12:27.760 when you got around or a pumpkin like world. Um, 0:12:27.840 --> 0:12:29.520 coordinate system A lot of times they're not a lot 0:12:29.559 --> 0:12:31.720 of times. Every time you'll see a map, there's gonna 0:12:31.720 --> 0:12:34.839 be some kind of a coordinate system. If it's a 0:12:34.880 --> 0:12:39.720 Thomas Guide, Like before the advent of online smartphone maps, 0:12:40.480 --> 0:12:42.120 when I lived in l A, the Thomas Guide was 0:12:42.160 --> 0:12:45.480 your best friend. Um. And that's just a simple grid system. 0:12:45.520 --> 0:12:46.800 Like you look up, hey, I want to go to 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:50.600 to Panga Canyon, Go to page four hundred and look 0:12:50.679 --> 0:12:53.120 up F six and then you'll just map your way 0:12:53.160 --> 0:12:56.520 from there. Yeah. The alphabets across the top numbers run 0:12:56.600 --> 0:13:00.920 down the side and you find F six and sink 0:13:00.960 --> 0:13:05.000 someone's battleship. Um. If it's like a map of the 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:08.679 world they're probably gonna show you, um launch student latitude, 0:13:09.360 --> 0:13:13.800 but not necessarily something you can navigate with, you know, no, 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:16.440 but it should it should be accurate as the point, 0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:18.559 well accurate, but not like you don't want to take 0:13:18.559 --> 0:13:20.920 a map of the world into the woods if you're orienteering, 0:13:21.080 --> 0:13:24.800 you know, you want a topographical map. Tricky to read, 0:13:24.800 --> 0:13:26.280 by the way, they ever looked at a topo map 0:13:26.559 --> 0:13:29.240 like been camping and stuff, because you were talking about 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:33.319 hip symmetric tents to indicate different changes in altitude right 0:13:33.720 --> 0:13:38.439 or elevation. Topographical maps use contour lines and yeah, you 0:13:38.559 --> 0:13:41.400 better know what you're doing because it's not necessarily intuitive. 0:13:41.559 --> 0:13:43.400 It's not intuitive at all. You just have to learn 0:13:43.440 --> 0:13:45.600 it and then once you learn it, you can wrap 0:13:45.600 --> 0:13:47.920 your head around it. Usually the closer the lines are 0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:50.600 or every time, the closer the lines are together, the 0:13:50.679 --> 0:13:54.319 more steep the change in elevation is right, and lines 0:13:54.360 --> 0:13:56.800 that are kind of spread out indicate like a very 0:13:56.880 --> 0:14:00.720 slow Yeah, I think that slope. Been a while since 0:14:00.720 --> 0:14:05.480 I'm taking basic orienteering. Is that a word orienteering? Yeah? 0:14:05.960 --> 0:14:09.520 I've not heard it really, Yeah, are you messing with 0:14:09.559 --> 0:14:12.200 me on this episode? Now? Orienteering is when, like you, 0:14:12.280 --> 0:14:14.040 they'd give you a map and a compass and send 0:14:14.040 --> 0:14:15.880 you out in the woods. Yeah. I thought that was 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:21.240 called trailblazing. Sure you can. You're also trailblazing. Okay, well 0:14:21.280 --> 0:14:23.520 hold on before we go any further. Um, it's time 0:14:23.560 --> 0:14:32.320 for a message break. Okay. So we're back and we're 0:14:32.360 --> 0:14:35.520 talking about map drawing conventions, believe it or not. And 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:37.440 there's a cool here's a cool experiment you can do 0:14:37.520 --> 0:14:39.200 if you want to know how difficult it is to 0:14:39.880 --> 0:14:41.960 draw a map and have it look accurate. Get a balloon, 0:14:42.680 --> 0:14:48.480 blow it up, Um, draw whatever you want, but draw, 0:14:48.600 --> 0:14:53.120 you know, the United States in Mexico and South America 0:14:53.160 --> 0:14:56.640 in Canada, Canada in there, and then deflate that balloon 0:14:56.680 --> 0:14:58.960 and see what it looks like. And that will give 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:01.840 you a little bit of insight into how tough it 0:15:01.880 --> 0:15:04.480 is to be a cartographer. Right. I mean you mentioned 0:15:04.560 --> 0:15:09.200 um lines of longitude and latitude. Right, those are coordinates 0:15:09.240 --> 0:15:12.840 on any map, and since their coordinates on a map, 0:15:13.440 --> 0:15:18.120 um people use them to navigate by. Right. But since 0:15:18.760 --> 0:15:22.920 we're going from a sphere to a flat plane, you 0:15:22.960 --> 0:15:25.080 have to figure out how to adjust for that, and 0:15:25.120 --> 0:15:28.440 you're basically making a decision. You're gonna say, Okay, am 0:15:28.520 --> 0:15:30.440 I going to make it so that the angles if 0:15:30.480 --> 0:15:33.040 somebody draws a straight line, the angles are all going 0:15:33.120 --> 0:15:35.360 to be the same along that line, Meaning you can 0:15:35.400 --> 0:15:37.720 follow that line on a compass in the real world 0:15:37.920 --> 0:15:41.000 and get there. It's called a rum line. Or are 0:15:41.160 --> 0:15:47.680 the lines of latitude which are called parallels, Yeah, and 0:15:47.800 --> 0:15:55.280 lines of longitude are meridians. They're going to be equidistant accurately. Like, 0:15:55.360 --> 0:15:58.720 that's the conundrum. That's the big conundrum with maps typically, Yeah, 0:15:58.760 --> 0:16:01.080 like where do you want your curiousy two be right? 0:16:01.280 --> 0:16:03.240 Which is pretty weird. I never really thought about it though, 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:05.760 like that, you know, like you have to it's an 0:16:05.760 --> 0:16:08.520 interesting job, and that you have to know that I 0:16:08.560 --> 0:16:10.880 cannot you cannot draw a perfect map on a piece 0:16:10.880 --> 0:16:14.880 of paper. So where am I gonna um fludge? Essentially? 0:16:15.320 --> 0:16:16.800 And you do this. You figure this out with what 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:20.560 they call map projections, and that is basically the method 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:24.960 that you choose to project that severe onto a flat surface. Right, So, Josh, 0:16:25.320 --> 0:16:27.520 you've cracked the code. I have not. This is a 0:16:27.680 --> 0:16:30.960 This is a very kind of it's tough to to 0:16:31.080 --> 0:16:35.560 think of because we're talking about now how distortions occur, 0:16:36.440 --> 0:16:41.440 and um, so there's different ways to manipulate how something's distorted. 0:16:41.720 --> 0:16:45.440 First of all, let's say you are making a new projection. Okay, right, 0:16:45.480 --> 0:16:51.680 that's that's a different manipulation of distortion, right as a projection, um, 0:16:51.720 --> 0:16:54.120 and you're making a brand new one. One of the things, 0:16:54.160 --> 0:16:57.040 one of the tools you can use is called um 0:16:57.440 --> 0:17:02.280 tisso's indoka tricks T I S S O, t apostrophe 0:17:02.440 --> 0:17:05.879 s too. So those are the circles. Yeah, and what 0:17:05.920 --> 0:17:11.720 you do is you just overlay the equal distant uh 0:17:11.880 --> 0:17:15.680 exactly the same aka identical circles. It like a grid 0:17:15.720 --> 0:17:17.879 of circles right over a globe. And then when you 0:17:17.920 --> 0:17:21.920 make your projection, the circles will distort and you will 0:17:21.960 --> 0:17:26.080 be able to see where your distortions are on different areas, um, 0:17:26.240 --> 0:17:28.879 how they distort, like what direction they're going to distort it, 0:17:28.920 --> 0:17:32.680 and get an exist an idea of how your your 0:17:32.720 --> 0:17:37.320 projection is distorted. Right. Um. And the reason that maps 0:17:37.359 --> 0:17:40.520 distort again is because you're taking a three dimensional spherical 0:17:40.560 --> 0:17:44.400 representation and putting it on a two dimensional flat surface. 0:17:45.200 --> 0:17:49.679 And the projection that we're all very familiar with the 0:17:49.720 --> 0:17:52.240 one that we use almost across the board is the 0:17:52.280 --> 0:17:56.160 Mercat projection. And there is a guy named gerardist Picator 0:17:56.200 --> 0:17:58.800 who in fifteen sixty nine created a map of the world. 0:17:59.560 --> 0:18:03.000 And Mark Hater decided that I'm gonna make my maps 0:18:03.280 --> 0:18:07.040 for sailors, and he made a very important decision. He 0:18:07.160 --> 0:18:10.400 made it so that rum lines where you measure between 0:18:10.960 --> 0:18:14.720 two points on this map, and you can follow that 0:18:14.840 --> 0:18:17.320 angle with your compass in real life and you will 0:18:17.359 --> 0:18:22.840 get there. He made it so that those were precise, 0:18:23.440 --> 0:18:26.840 but he gave up lines of longitude and latitude being precise. 0:18:27.440 --> 0:18:30.640 And he figured out how to represent this very cleverly, 0:18:31.359 --> 0:18:34.680 where on lines of I'm sorry, not lines of longitude 0:18:34.720 --> 0:18:39.240 and lolatitude, just latitude since since the Earth gets narrower 0:18:39.280 --> 0:18:41.360 at the top because it's a ball, and it's widest 0:18:41.359 --> 0:18:45.960 at the middle, the anything above or below the equator, 0:18:46.000 --> 0:18:48.960 as you get further away, the lines get the lines 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:53.560 between the latitudinal lines get bigger and bigger the spaces 0:18:53.640 --> 0:18:56.480 between them, so like you would see on the globe. Maybe, yeah, 0:18:56.480 --> 0:19:01.040 it's a it's a really clever representation of of what 0:19:01.280 --> 0:19:03.480 happens when you take a piece of paper and put 0:19:03.520 --> 0:19:07.840 it around a globe. A ball that's the Mercater projection. 0:19:08.440 --> 0:19:10.359 And the way to figure out how he did this, 0:19:10.480 --> 0:19:11.960 or to imagine how he did is to take a 0:19:12.040 --> 0:19:15.359 cylinder like a piece of paper and roll it up 0:19:15.400 --> 0:19:17.840 into the shape of the cylinder. This is a magic 0:19:17.880 --> 0:19:21.320 piece of paper cylinder, and you have a balloon, and 0:19:21.359 --> 0:19:23.720 it's a magic balloon. That's it's the same balloon we've 0:19:23.880 --> 0:19:26.159 drawn our world on. It can be, but it's a 0:19:26.200 --> 0:19:29.120 magic version of it because we needed to have our 0:19:29.160 --> 0:19:32.640 world on it, drawing on it perfectly. And you blow 0:19:32.760 --> 0:19:37.320 up this balloon until it hits um an edge of 0:19:37.400 --> 0:19:40.000 the cylinder, right, so it's just touching the inside of 0:19:40.000 --> 0:19:42.879 the cylinder on two points one on either side. What 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:45.960 that balloon has just become is tangent to the cylinder. 0:19:46.520 --> 0:19:49.359 The sekin is where the cylinder would like intersect the balloon, 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:52.000 but right now it's just touching. And you take a 0:19:52.040 --> 0:19:55.199 Mercader projection, and you've got a perfectly blown up balloon 0:19:55.520 --> 0:19:59.200 inside a cylinder. And that's what you imagine is the projection. 0:19:59.359 --> 0:20:01.240 You have to take it a little further. You blow 0:20:01.320 --> 0:20:03.800 up the balloon until it completely fills up the cylinder. 0:20:04.320 --> 0:20:06.879 So now all of the information on this balloon is 0:20:06.880 --> 0:20:09.800 pressed up against the inside of the cylinder, the place 0:20:09.840 --> 0:20:13.040 where it was tangent, where it touched naturally when the 0:20:13.040 --> 0:20:14.960 blue was just filled up and it was just a sphere. 0:20:15.800 --> 0:20:18.560 That's going to be undistorted. Okay, that makes sense. The 0:20:18.640 --> 0:20:20.840 stuff that you're blowing up until the balloon is no 0:20:20.920 --> 0:20:23.760 longer a spear but is filling up the cylinder, that 0:20:23.920 --> 0:20:27.359 stuff becomes distorted. And the further toward the edges you go, 0:20:27.440 --> 0:20:30.600 the more distorted. Is now we can pop our magic 0:20:30.600 --> 0:20:33.320 balloon because all that information has been transferred on the 0:20:33.359 --> 0:20:36.720 inside of this cylindrical paper. And you unroll it and 0:20:36.840 --> 0:20:41.119 there's your Mercator projection. Pretty good? Yeah, I think I 0:20:41.160 --> 0:20:43.360 get it? Do you really? I got it more than 0:20:43.400 --> 0:20:46.400 I did than when I read this like eight times. Yeah, 0:20:46.440 --> 0:20:49.040 you know, yeah, Uncle Josh coming through for me. But 0:20:49.080 --> 0:20:51.800 in the center of a Mercator projection, the distortions are 0:20:51.800 --> 0:20:55.600 going to be the least because it's tangent to the cylinder. 0:20:55.680 --> 0:20:58.720 That's where it's just naturally touching the edges. It's not 0:20:58.880 --> 0:21:02.640 distort it's not being forced into the cylindrical shape. Yeah, 0:21:02.640 --> 0:21:06.280 that makes sense. We should call this one What maps 0:21:06.480 --> 0:21:09.800 the Sun? Part two? Write. It is really hard to 0:21:09.840 --> 0:21:12.520 wrap your head around. It is, especially when you're like 0:21:12.600 --> 0:21:14.920 me and you're bad with maps. To begin with. Um, 0:21:15.000 --> 0:21:18.240 so we talked about projections. Um. You know, depending on 0:21:18.280 --> 0:21:20.639 what you want to do, different projections have. You know, 0:21:20.640 --> 0:21:23.280 they're good points and they're bad points. Um. If you 0:21:23.480 --> 0:21:27.520 want to have an equal area map, you would make 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:31.760 an equal area map. That means you preserve the correct 0:21:31.840 --> 0:21:34.520 area and it's going to distort the shape of your 0:21:34.560 --> 0:21:37.399 land masses. It might look weird if you're looking at 0:21:37.400 --> 0:21:40.040 the entire world, but it's area wise, it's going to 0:21:40.119 --> 0:21:45.760 be accurate. Um. If you have the pseudo conical Robinson projection, 0:21:46.840 --> 0:21:49.240 it's gonna that's the map that you're probably most used 0:21:49.280 --> 0:21:54.120 to seeing that actually looks quote unquote correct. But their 0:21:54.160 --> 0:21:57.720 distances and direction aren't aren't accurate in that case, right, 0:21:57.720 --> 0:22:00.240 So it's not good for navigating, it's good for being Oh, 0:22:00.280 --> 0:22:02.320 so this is how the continents are situation. That's where 0:22:02.359 --> 0:22:07.439 Russia is Asia or is it Europe? But depending on 0:22:07.840 --> 0:22:13.200 where you begin, Um, the cartographer has a lot of 0:22:13.280 --> 0:22:16.800 leeway and deciding, like what is going to be the 0:22:16.800 --> 0:22:20.239 center of the world in this map. So Russia may 0:22:20.280 --> 0:22:22.840 not actually be over there. Depending on the map, it 0:22:22.920 --> 0:22:26.080 can be up into the left a little more in reality, 0:22:26.600 --> 0:22:29.040 and it may be a little smaller. It just depends 0:22:29.080 --> 0:22:32.200 on You remember where the balloon touched the inside of 0:22:32.240 --> 0:22:37.040 the cylinder, and that was the tangent um. Wherever you 0:22:37.560 --> 0:22:40.760 position the cylinder around the world, where it's going to touch, 0:22:41.400 --> 0:22:44.720 that's your line of least distortion, And that can be 0:22:44.760 --> 0:22:47.000 the center of your whole map, but it doesn't necessarily 0:22:47.040 --> 0:22:49.280 mean that. In reality it's the center of the world. 0:22:50.560 --> 0:22:53.760 So it's up to the cartographer what they're what choices 0:22:53.800 --> 0:22:57.080 they're going to make to make what the center, what's where, 0:22:57.400 --> 0:23:00.560