Peters Projection vs Mercator Projection

Has anyone seen this before? It was brought to my attention by a post on FB, and has me sitting here staring, this feels right, and I think I can accept it, but DAMN





Kinda puts things into a different perspective no?


I actually had a dream a week or so ago where I was flying over Australia, KNEW I was over Australia, but it looked weird and I couldn't figure out why. Now I know. It looked exactly as pictured HERE


For a more physical perspective, check THIS out!

(sorry for not knowing how to upload pictures :/ oh well lol

So the question is... where are you now?

You should know that it is impossible to flatten out a sphere like the Earth and have it represented on a flat surface like a map without distortions of some type, as in size, shape, direction, position, angles, etc. If you want to know what the Earth surface truly looks like, use a globe.

The military uses a The Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM), as well as many other organizations around the world.

"The UTM system is not a single map projection. The system instead divides the Earth into sixty zones, each a six-degree band of longitude, and uses a secant transverse Mercator projection in each zone."
en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by joeyv23

Like all flat maps of the globe, the Peters Projection has many distortions:

"Peters's chosen projection suffers extreme distortion in the polar regions, as any cylindrical projection must, and its distortion along the equator is considerable. Several scholars have remarked on the irony of the projection's undistorted presentation of the mid latitudes, including Peters's native Germany, at the expense of the low latitudes, which host more of the technologically underdeveloped nations.[27][28] The claim of distance fidelity is particularly problematic: Peters's map lacks distance fidelity everywhere except along the 45th parallels north and south, and then only in the direction of those parallels. No world projection is good at preserving distances everywhere; Peters's and all other cylindric projections are especially bad in that regard because east-west distances inevitably balloon toward the poles."

en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by lunarcartographer


That's all well and good, I know some may scoff at this, take it as you will, but only just about a week ago, I dreamed that I flew over a landmass, knowing it was Australia, and then a week later this comes to my awareness and matches exactly what I saw. And yes I have taken into consideration the potential distortion of viewing this in my cosmic sector/time-space/astral plane/dreamscape, but I remember the dream clearly, and this is clearly what I saw. So wikipedia aside, I like this version so that's what I'm going with

Thanks OP ! No one hardly ever discusses this and I find it fascinating you apparently saw things "correctly". S&F

reply to post by lunarcartographer


I find it strange, and please don't take this personally, that of all the members of this site that could possibly be the first to reply to this thread about cartography, and it was a quick one to boot, would have anything about cartography in their screenname. Then while ignoring the premise of the video moves to cast doubt on the info presented or prove me wrong. I appreciate your feedback, and I'm not saying this projection is perfect, but again, it is how I choose to view our planet from now on

reply to post by joeyv23


That's fine, just pointing out that if you want a true vision of the surface of the earth, without the various distortions of 'any' flat map projection; you must use a globe.

reply to post by lunarcartographer


Aware, and thanks Like I said before I didn't mean for anything I said to you to be taken personally, it was just coincidental in a big way. I was given this Dymaxion, or Fuller Projection Map earlier that shows the landmasses of the Earth as one chain of islands, pretty cool! I still like Peters Projection because of the appearance of the landmasses looking like a broken mountain.

joeyv23
reply to post by lunarcartographer

 

Aware, and thanks

Like I said before I didn't mean for anything I said to you to be taken personally, it was just coincidental in a big way. I was given this Dymaxion, or Fuller Projection Map earlier that shows the landmasses of the Earth as one chain of islands, pretty cool! I still like Peters Projection because of the appearance of the landmasses looking like a broken mountain.

Here's the Fuller Projection Map on a gif, from the Wikipedia page:

en.wikipedia.org...



Created by the genius wunderkind Buckminster Fuller. Doesn't mean it's entirely accurate as to size, but he did his best.

And of course the saddest thing about maps using real photographs is the tragedy of how much of the land of the earth is desert. Soil that has turned to sand, and this desertification continues to advance daily.

reply to post by Aleister


Got this from a research friend of mine on a different forum,

"LB says: It is curious that when you turn the Earth upside-down, it has a layout very much like Mars (back when it had a north, polar ocean). That might be what freaks people out--a kind of, "race memory."** Of course, there have been times the Earth has been in that position, relative to the other planets. The crust of the Earth does slide around, and anywhere you find a desert, was once a polar cap."


**[note: This comes from the belief that Martians souls were moved here to Earth when it became too harsh to sustain life on the surface, interestingly enough there is a book called "Roads in the Sky" publised in 1959 by George Hunt Williamson that has a chapter call Martian Miniatures about how Native Americans had drawn patterns on pottery that were eerily similar to the maps of Mars created by Dr Percival Lowell. It's a very interesting read, HERE'S a link to a digital copy of the book] This is a deviation from the topic, but I wanted to give a resource for clarification on the words "race memory"

Wooo Hooo!!!!

A cartography thread! Outstanding. Finally a chance to put all those college cart classes to good use.

I can't watch the video but I am sort of tracking from the comments.

And it looks like the whole world beat me to it. Can't make spherical into flat and have it come out right. There are a pile of different projections depending on what you are trying to do. Most folks get the Mercator beat into their head. Move the cheese on them and Gadzooks! What is "wrong" with this map? Throw in talk of the Geoid surface and it's off to the races.

...ahhhh....good times.

reply to post by ABNARTY


Because I work night shift and it was slow tonight.. I decided to help you out. Lesson learned, transcribing videos is no fun lol


[Scene starts and camera pans left showing a room that is set up for a presentation of some sort. A woman enters the room. A sign can be seen to the right of the door with the text “Organization of Cartographers for Social Equality”]

Woman: “Hi, I'm sorry. Sorry I'm late”
Project Leader: “Not a problem”
Woman: “I'm CJ Craig”
Group leader.: “Of course you are, I'm Dr. John Fallow. This is Dr. Cynthia Sails. [Dr. Fallow motions to woman standing to left of presentation board] And, uh, Professor Donald Hyuuk”
CJ: “Hyuuk?”
Professor Hyuuk: “Hyuuk.”
CJ: “OK, and you are the Organization of Cartographers for Social Equality.”
Dr. Fallow: “Well we're from the OCSE. We have many members.”
CJ: “How many?”
Dr. Fallow: “4,300 dues paid members”
CJ: “What are the dues?”
Dr. Fallow: “$20 a year for the newsletter”
CJ: “Let's start”
[Man walks into room]
Man: “Wait! Wait I wanna see this.”
CJ: “This is Josh Lyman.”
Dr Fallow: “Indeed you are.”
[Josh shakes Dr. Fallow's hand in greeting]
Dr. Fallow: “Hi”
CJ: “Josh this is Dr. Fallow and his merry men
[OCSE members laugh]
Dr. Fallow: “Yes.”
CJ: “Shall we begin?”
Dr. Fallow: “Yes.”
[CJ and Josh sit down to receive presentation, both putting on a professional persona and crossing their legs]
Dr. Fallow: “Plain and simple, we'd like President Bartlett to aggressively support legislation that would make it mandatory for every public school in America to teach geography using the Peter's Projection Map instead of the traditional Mercator.”
Josh: “Give me 200 bucks and it's done.”
Professor Hyuuk: “Really?”
CJ: “No... Why are we changing maps?”
Dr. Sails: “Because, CJ, the Mercator Projection has fostered European Imperialist attitudes for centuries and created and ethnic bias agaisnt the third world.”
CJ: “Really?”
Dr. Fallow: “The German cartographer, Mercator, originally designed this map [starts presentation with a slide of Mercator Projection Map] in 1569 as a navigational tool for European sailors.”
Professor Hyuuk: “The map enlarges areas at the poles to create straight lines of constant bearing or geographic direction.”
Dr. Sail: “So it makes it easy to cross an ocean.”
Dr. Fallow: “But,”
CJ: “Yes?”
Dr. Fallow: “It distorts the relative size of nations and continents.”
CJ: “Are you saying the map is wrong?”
Dr. Fallow: “Oh dear, yes. Look at Greenland.”
CJ:”OK.”
Dr. Fallow: “Now look at Africa.”
CJ: “OK.”
Dr. Fallow: “The two landmasses appear to be roughly the same size.”
CJ: “Yes.”
Dr. Fallow: “Would it blow your mind if I told you that Africa is, in reality, 14 times larger?”
[Josh looking skeptical, uncrosses his legs]
CJ: “Yes.”
Dr. Sail: “Here we have Europe looking considerably larger than South America. With it's 6.9 million sq. miles, South America is almost double the size of Europe's 3.8 million.”
Professor Hyuuk: “Alaska appears 3 times as large as Mexico, when Mexico is larger by .1 million sq. miles.
Dr. Sail: “Germany appears in the middle of the map, when it is at the northernmost quarter of the Earth.”
[Josh touches his brow, then holds out his hand in protest]
Josh: “Wa-wait. Relative size is one thing, but you're telling me that Germany isn't where we think it is?”
Dr. Fallow(smiling): “Nothing is where you think it is.”
CJ: “Where is it?”
Dr. Fallow: “I'm glad you asked.”
[Slide changes to Peter's Projection Map. Dr. Fallow points to slide]
Dr. Fallow: “The Peter's Projection”
[CJ uncrosses her legs and both she and Josh sit up and lean forward to get a better look]
Dr. Sail: “It has fidelity of axis.”
Professor Hyuuk: “Fidelity of position.”
Dr. Sail: “East/West lines are parallel and intersect North/South axis at right angles.”
[CJ points at presentation screen]
CJ (looking confused/concerned): “What the hell is that??”
Dr. Fallow: “It's where you've been living this whole time.. Should we continue?”
[Josh makes $5 foot-long gesture with hands and takes a deep breathe in]
Josh: “Uh-huh”

--Scene cuts for commercial--

[Camera pans from left to right allowing you to see a slide of a left and right comparison of the Mercator Projection and Peter's Projection. Everyone is now standing in conference]

Dr. Fallow: “So, you're probably wondering what all this has to do with social equality.”
CJ: “No, I'm wondering where France really is.”
[Josh steps forward to put himself at the center of attention. When he speaks, he has a tone indicative of someone looking to end a conversation/meeting, breathing is exasperated]
Josh: “Guys, we wanna thank you very much for coming in..”
[CJ puts a hand out to stop Josh from moving any farther forward]
CJ: “Hang on, we're gonna finish this.”
[Josh raises eyebrows, but, looking at CJ, quickly consents]
CJ: “OK.”
Professor Hyuuk: “What does this have to do with social equality you ask?”
Josh: “She asked.”
Professor Hyuuk: “Salvatory Natolly of the National Council for Social Studies argues 'In our society we unconsciously equate size with importance and even power.”
[CJ and Josh look at each other for a moment, then CJ nods in agreement. Josh looks at OCSE members]
Josh: “I'm gonna check in on Tommy.” [Josh turns to leave]
CJ: “Go.”
Josh: “These guys find [unintelligable] on that map you'll call me right?”
CJ: “Probably not.”
Josh: “Ok” [walks out of room]
Dr. Fallow: “And 3rd world countries are misrepresented. They're likely to be valued less. When Mercator maps exaggerate the importance of Western civilization when the top of the map is given to the Northern hemisphere, and the bottom is given to the Southern, then people will tend to adopt top and bottom attitudes.
CJ(appearing confused/flustered): “Wai-.. well where else could you put the Northern hemisphere but on the top?”
Dr. Sail: “On the bottom.”
CJ: “How?”
Dr. Fallow: “Like this.”
[Dr. Fallow changes screen to upside down image of Peter's Projection Map.]
CJ: “Yeah, but you can't do that.”
Dr. Fallow: “Why?”
CJ: “Because it's freaking me out.”

reply to post by joeyv23


Good Gravy!!!! You typed all that? A slow night indeed. Much thanks I just live in the boonies and my internet chokes on videos.

Additional comments:

I do not know what show or whatever this is but these folks make it sound like there is some kind of mapping mafia out there trying to keep Greenland perceptively large. There are scads of projections out there. They all make the Earth "look" different. Unless it is a globe, they all will fail to relate spherical successfully. Small areas come out OK but the whole planet?

So these folks trying to make one projection sound like a socially acceptable alternative is a pipe dream. It makes me wonder what their angle is. It's like saying yellow stop signs are morally superior to red stop signs. Oh, BTW, I own the yellow stop sign factory.

ABNARTY
reply to post by joeyv23

 

Good Gravy!!!! You typed all that? A slow night indeed. Much thanks

I just live in the boonies and my internet chokes on videos.

Additional comments:

I do not know what show or whatever this is but these folks make it sound like there is some kind of mapping mafia out there trying to keep Greenland perceptively large. There are scads of projections out there. They all make the Earth "look" different. Unless it is a globe, they all will fail to relate spherical successfully. Small areas come out OK but the whole planet?

So these folks trying to make one projection sound like a socially acceptable alternative is a pipe dream. It makes me wonder what their angle is. It's like saying yellow stop signs are morally superior to red stop signs. Oh, BTW, I own the yellow stop sign factory.

I work night shift at a hotel, so a quiet, slow night is a good thing The show is The West Wing. I've never seen it myself, but the clip was posted and since I'm interested in the geography of our planet, and how it got there (I personally believe that the Earth has been, and still is expanding) and it caught my attention.

Also... since you own the yellow sign factory, perhaps you have a spot open for PR? I'm pretty sure with minimal effort I could convince droves of people that yellow stop signs are better Then again, people are easily convinced as long as you say "Studies show" and "According to polls" lol :/

reply to post by joeyv23


It's a deal on the PR bit