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After Seeing These 30 Maps You’ll Never Look At The World The Same
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The reason why certain countries look bigger or smaller than others is that of something called the Mercator Projection. Putting a 3D planet on a two-dimensional world map was something of a challenge for early cartographers. So a Flemish geographer and cartographer named Gerardus Mercator came up with a solution for the most accurate world map. In 1569 he designed an atlas that could be accurately used for navigation purposes. Still, the downside was that his system distorted the size of objects depending on their position relative to the equator. Because of this, landmasses like Antarctica and Greenland appeared much bigger than they actually are. Though there are around 40 types of map projections, from conical to polyhedral and retroazimuthal, depicting the true size maps, this one is still used the most because of its convenience and simplicity. And none of these projections can be titled 'the real world map,' just because they all depict the same Earth through a different lens.
To show how incorrect our understanding of countries by size is, a website called thetruesize.com lets you move landmasses into different locations. Bored Panda has played a bit on world maps with countries provided by this site, and this is what we found.
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US Moved Down Next To Australia Looks Unbelievably Small
Size of contiguous United States Not counting Alaska & Hawaii, the 48 contiguous states occupy a combined area of 3.12 million sq. mi. While Australia is 2.99 million sq miles - I never realized they were so close in size!
If Romania Was An Island In The Arctic Ocean
I don't get why the map was done so inaccuratelly? can somone explain?
Australia Is Way Bigger Than You May Think - It Covers Almost The Whole Of Europe
If Brazil Was In Asia It Would Be Massive
The map of the earth is a 2 d representation of a 3 d object, that's why the size is different, because the map is distorted.
Indonesia Would Spread Almost Across The Whole Of Russia
Greenland Is Not So Big When Compared To USA And Brazil
When You Move Canada To South America
Nope. The width of South America at its widest point is 2,705 miles (4,353 km), The width of Canada at its widest point is 5,780 miles (9,306 km).
California Moved Onto The UK Shows They're Quite Similar In Size
Japan Can Stretch Almost Across Canada
It all has to do with putting a round object onto a flat, rectangular presentation. Locations near the poles get stretched and distorted, appearing much larger. The point of the map is that IF Japan was in that particular geographic location (closer to the North Pole), it would look much larger when transcribed onto a flat map.
This Is How India Changes As You Move It North
Wholly Molley! No wonder I get so many customer service agents in India.... that is one HUGE country.
Canada Moved Down Onto The US Reveals That Both Countries Are Pretty Much The Same Size
but 2/3rds of Canada is uninhabitable because it's in the f-ing article circle.
How This All Works
You should move this to the top for the dimwits. This is a great series of posts. Thanks for sharing - fun stuff :D
If Poland Was An Island In The Norwegian Sea
The US Could Easily Cover The Whole Of Canada But It Becomes Much Smaller When It's Moved South
When You Move Mexico Onto Greenland Its Size Increases Dramatically
If Lithuania Was An Island In The Barents Sea And Artic Ocean
Moving UK North And South Reveals How It Actually Compares To Other Countries
How The Size Of Russia Changes As You Move It South
#27 Tiny Iceland Compared To New York
Let Me Just Make This Easy; The Issue Is Peters (accurate) Vs Mercator (inaccurate).
"Peters" (actually Gall-Peters, as Gall came up with the projection long before) is no truer than Mercator overall. The key phrase here is area: Gall-Peters is designed to preserve relative areas, while Mercator preserves direction and shape. "True representation of land area" and "Incorrect/false representation of land area" are not entirely false statements, but they are too easily read as "Gall-Peters good, Mercator bad!" Which is simply not the case. But despite the famous West Wing scene, in fact there are many better projections than Gall-Peters for showing the whole world — and they have been and continue to be in use in most major publications related to maps and geography for many, many years. There's no single most popular projection, but Mollweide, Winkel Tripel, and perhaps Robinson remain some of the most common. In short: each projection has its own uses, and its own shortcomings. Mercator was never meant to be the only projection ever used.
Texas Moved On Top Of Alaska Shows That They're Almost The Same Size
By almost the same size do you really mean less than half as big as Alaska?
You Cannot Make Legitimate Size Comparison Unless You Are Doing So On An Equal Area Map
Whoever made this originally, was for sure, a bored panda.
This is widely known phenomenon: the problem with our world maps is that we try to map a round object on a flat surface. As far as I know, there is no mathematical method to map it 1:1. Because of this setup, our view on countries on world maps are distorted. Also nice fact: depending on where you buy your map, it's different everywhere, as each country places itself in the middle of the map
Fun & true fact : Canada don't place himself in the center on the map, we actually put the Atlantic Ocean/Europe in the center (like #12; #14). This way we don't hurt anyone.
In America we put ourselves in the middle because we are assholes
In Brazil Europe and Africa is in the center.
excellent Panda..
You CAN map it 1:1 quite easily, if you allow the map to be other shapes than a rectangle =).
Only one country in the world places itself in the middle of the map. Apparently you live in there.
Never seen a globe? Pictures of Earth from space?
False and false. 1) There is one way to map the globe 1:1, it's on a globe! 2) I have travelled and studied in several countries and never seen anyone place themselves at the center of the map, although I am sure the odd country does it.
you didn't read my comment carefully 1) " is that we try to map a round object on a flat surface" FLAT surface, I wasn't talking about globes :) and we have a 2D maps here 2) well how do you explain this american world map then? asea-57934...95d0e9.jpg
I lived in Australia. They most certainly don't put North America in the middle of their maps lol
Thanks for that info! I enjoyed your fun-facts as much as I enjoyed these maps.
I'm amazed at how ignorant people in the comments are. :( sorry
One thing that never amazes me is the ignorance of people. :)
Whoever made this originally, was for sure, a bored panda.
This is widely known phenomenon: the problem with our world maps is that we try to map a round object on a flat surface. As far as I know, there is no mathematical method to map it 1:1. Because of this setup, our view on countries on world maps are distorted. Also nice fact: depending on where you buy your map, it's different everywhere, as each country places itself in the middle of the map
Fun & true fact : Canada don't place himself in the center on the map, we actually put the Atlantic Ocean/Europe in the center (like #12; #14). This way we don't hurt anyone.
In America we put ourselves in the middle because we are assholes
In Brazil Europe and Africa is in the center.
excellent Panda..
You CAN map it 1:1 quite easily, if you allow the map to be other shapes than a rectangle =).
Only one country in the world places itself in the middle of the map. Apparently you live in there.
Never seen a globe? Pictures of Earth from space?
False and false. 1) There is one way to map the globe 1:1, it's on a globe! 2) I have travelled and studied in several countries and never seen anyone place themselves at the center of the map, although I am sure the odd country does it.
you didn't read my comment carefully 1) " is that we try to map a round object on a flat surface" FLAT surface, I wasn't talking about globes :) and we have a 2D maps here 2) well how do you explain this american world map then? asea-57934...95d0e9.jpg
I lived in Australia. They most certainly don't put North America in the middle of their maps lol
Thanks for that info! I enjoyed your fun-facts as much as I enjoyed these maps.
I'm amazed at how ignorant people in the comments are. :( sorry
One thing that never amazes me is the ignorance of people. :)