You Can Now Drag and Drop Whole Countries to Compare Their Size
By News
Published 4 years ago on
January 20, 2020
Share
[aggregation-styles]
Big Think
Is Texas really bigger than Poland? Does Russia stretch further east to west than Africa does north to south? And how big a chunk of Europe would the U.S. cover? If you’re losing sleep over questions like these, you’ll find relief at TheTrueSize.com, a web tool designed to provide answers about the relative sizes of countries (and U.S. states).
Created by James Talmage and Damon Maneice, the application was inspired by an episode of The West Wing, in which a delegation of the (fictional) Organisation of Cartographers for Social Equality (OCSE) asks the White House to get public schools to use world maps that use the Peters projection rather than the traditional Mercator projection.
Why? On a Mercator map, countries in further north (and south) are shown larger than they are relative to countries closer to the equator. In so doing, one of the OCSE scientists explains, “the Mercator projection has fostered European imperialist attitudes for centuries and created an ethnic bias against the Third World,” says one OCSE scientist.
Read More →
Big Think
Is Texas really bigger than Poland? Does Russia stretch further east to west than Africa does north to south? And how big a chunk of Europe would the U.S. cover? If you’re losing sleep over questions like these, you’ll find relief at TheTrueSize.com, a web tool designed to provide answers about the relative sizes of countries (and U.S. states).
Created by James Talmage and Damon Maneice, the application was inspired by an episode of The West Wing, in which a delegation of the (fictional) Organisation of Cartographers for Social Equality (OCSE) asks the White House to get public schools to use world maps that use the Peters projection rather than the traditional Mercator projection.
Why? On a Mercator map, countries in further north (and south) are shown larger than they are relative to countries closer to the equator. In so doing, one of the OCSE scientists explains, “the Mercator projection has fostered European imperialist attitudes for centuries and created an ethnic bias against the Third World,” says one OCSE scientist.
Read More →
By Frank Jacobs | 19 Dec 2019
RELATED TOPICS:
No data was found
Facebook News Tab Will Soon Be Unavailable as Meta Scales Back News and Political Content
Tech /
6 hours ago
Stock Market Today: Wall Street Rises to More Records to Close Out Its Latest Winning Month
Economy /
7 hours ago
A Fresno County First: Kerman Council Passes Amended Gaza Cease-Fire Resolution
Politics /
7 hours ago
UN Top Court Orders Israel to Open More Land Crossings for Aid into Gaza
World /
7 hours ago
Ex-Correctional Officer at Women’s Prison in California Sentenced for Sexually Abusing Inmates
Crime /
11 hours ago
Caitlin Clark and Iowa Draw Nearly 5 Million Viewers for Second-Round NCAA Win
Sports /
11 hours ago
Latest
Videos
Sports /
6 hours ago
Cronenworth’s Big Hit Helps Lift the Padres to a 6-4 Win Over Melvin’s Giants
Sports /
6 hours ago
Shohei Ohtani Reaches 3 Times in Home Debut as the Dodgers Rout the Cardinals 7-1
Tech /
6 hours ago
Facebook News Tab Will Soon Be Unavailable as Meta Scales Back News and Political Content
Economy /
7 hours ago
Stock Market Today: Wall Street Rises to More Records to Close Out Its Latest Winning Month
Politics /
7 hours ago
A Fresno County First: Kerman Council Passes Amended Gaza Cease-Fire Resolution
World /
7 hours ago