Everyone knows Greenland is the real proponent of the Mercator projection. Using the unfair influence of their massive perceived size on the map to unfairly inflate their importance in global politics and economics. It's time to put Greenland back in its place.
I am now wondering if Trump's Greenland obsession is because he thinks it's very bigly, due to Mercator (it appears larger than the US in a Mercator projection).
This is a very weird sounding pretense. Why does it matter if Africa in particular is bigger on the map compared to other countries and continents? How does area matter in general? It's not like we can infer anything useful from area comparisons. Also the map that is proposed (with the kinda-oval shape) is a map that I've seen a lot in school right next to now more common Mercator, and I'm from now here close to Africa.
I hope it's not sticking my neck out too far to claim that a large majority of people think the Mercator projection is accurate, or they don't think about accuracy at all and take it for granted. For example, it makes Russia insanely enormous, and therefore more fearsome than it deserves.
Yes, this is one of the most bizarre arguments I've seen in some time.
Are Americans afraid of Canada or Greenland because it appears quite large on a Mercator map? Are we more likely to send aid to Asia because it is in fact a larger continent than Africa?
So, whatever about Africa, it does seem like maybe this distortion has real consequences.
Noted very stable genius Donald Trump: "I love maps. And I always said: 'Look at the size of this. It's massive. That should be part of the United States.'"
It's not totally implausible that the grossly oversized depiction of Greenland on Mercator (it's shown as being larger than the US) actually had some impact on his asinine desire to annex Greenland.
Different projections have different uses. There's no one "correct" projection and anyway I've seen plenty of world maps using projections other than Mercator for quite a number of years now.
This sort of strident campaigning language is such an unhelpful framing in which to discuss the relative merits of different map projections.
Every world map must trade off between different types of distortion. There's no principled reason to demand a map perfectly respect relative area at the expense of other characteristics.
Personally for general world maps I typically prefer so-called ‘compromise’ pseudocylindrical projections such as Robinson, which try to minimise all types of distortion as much as possible, but even the much-maligned Mercator has its place.
It’s similar in the sense that it’s a pseudocylindrical projection. Unlike Robinson it opts for a strict equal-area property at the expense of less accurate direction and distance. In that respect it’s more similar to Eckert IV. Another interesting pseudocylindrical projection is Winkel Tripel, which explicitly tries to balance three types of distortion.
I’m not objecting to the Equal Earth projection, which is a perfectly respectable contribution to the pseudocylindrical repertoire, but to the language this site is using to promote it.
I assume it's my colorblindness, but on mobile when I move that slider back and forth I just see blue outlines appear around the countries with no other distinguishable changes.
I am not color blind AFAIK, and I had to move the slider back and forth many times to try to understand what they are trying to show (even though I kind of knew what to expect).
Not the best visualization I should say.
The colors could have been better used to highlight the difference IMO.
The colors and the sliders are both a bit extraneous to the point of the visualization, they're supposed to help but they kind of obscure the point.
For the northern landmasses, Greenland for example, the smaller outline is the equal-earth-projection, and the larger outline is the conventional Mercator projection. That's all there is to it.
I just viewed it on desktop, and here I can see the inner and outer outlines. On my phone I studied the diagram closely, but can't see the inner map outlines. Perhaps just a color profile thing on my phone.
All of the maps are awful at a global levels. If you fix one problem another comes up.
I am be surprised at the number of maps we look at today given that often we are looking at digital screens that could display an interactive globe as easily as a distorted old map.
I like the idea of questioning status quo, but not so sure this makes a whole lot of sense in 2025.
Meerkartor was developed to project a 3D GLOBE onto a flat surface.
We already have non-meerkartor projections such as the classic globe that should be found in every class-room, and modern digital variations such as Google Earth.
And the meerkartor projections we do use:
In USA, the meerkartor projection centers on the USA.
In europe, the meerkartor projection centers on Europe.
And in asia, guess where the center is?
Why can't Africa just start using their own projection too, with their preferences?
Readit News
Assuming there's a place for more Big Balls in federal government?
Deleted Comment
Are Americans afraid of Canada or Greenland because it appears quite large on a Mercator map? Are we more likely to send aid to Asia because it is in fact a larger continent than Africa?
You think voters will increase support for Africa (whatever that means) if their perceived size of the continent is increased?
Noted very stable genius Donald Trump: "I love maps. And I always said: 'Look at the size of this. It's massive. That should be part of the United States.'"
It's not totally implausible that the grossly oversized depiction of Greenland on Mercator (it's shown as being larger than the US) actually had some impact on his asinine desire to annex Greenland.
Every world map must trade off between different types of distortion. There's no principled reason to demand a map perfectly respect relative area at the expense of other characteristics.
Personally for general world maps I typically prefer so-called ‘compromise’ pseudocylindrical projections such as Robinson, which try to minimise all types of distortion as much as possible, but even the much-maligned Mercator has its place.
I’m not objecting to the Equal Earth projection, which is a perfectly respectable contribution to the pseudocylindrical repertoire, but to the language this site is using to promote it.
Not the best visualization I should say.
The colors could have been better used to highlight the difference IMO.
For the northern landmasses, Greenland for example, the smaller outline is the equal-earth-projection, and the larger outline is the conventional Mercator projection. That's all there is to it.
I am be surprised at the number of maps we look at today given that often we are looking at digital screens that could display an interactive globe as easily as a distorted old map.
Meerkartor was developed to project a 3D GLOBE onto a flat surface.
We already have non-meerkartor projections such as the classic globe that should be found in every class-room, and modern digital variations such as Google Earth.
And the meerkartor projections we do use:
In USA, the meerkartor projection centers on the USA.
In europe, the meerkartor projection centers on Europe.
And in asia, guess where the center is?
Why can't Africa just start using their own projection too, with their preferences?
And you can definitely do that because a large proportion of maps sold in Asia do actually have Asia more or less in the middle.