![]() ![]() But in reality, around two-thirds of Africa is north of the equator. North Americans tend to think of Africa as a located almost entirely in the southern hemisphere, similar to South America. Unauthorized use is prohibited.Īnother commonly misplaced continent is Africa. He recently revisited the paper and put together a story map that highlights three common misplacements mentioned in the paper, including the true longitudinal relationship between the Americas. “I actually remember them talking about this research paper over dinners when I was younger,” Nelson says. Nelson’s father, who was a geography professor at Central Michigan University, wrote a paper about geographical misconceptions in 1992 with some of his colleagues and input from Nelson’s mother, a high-school geography teacher. After all, it’s not called Southeast America. Mental maps are necessarily simplifications, and Nelson suspects the misplaced Americas may be partly a result of their names. There are lots of possible reasons for geographical misconceptions like this one, says cartographer John Nelson. But you may be surprised by the fact that virtually the entire South American continent is east of Florida. In fact, many of the maps in our heads share the same errors, some of which are quite large-and surprisingly resistant to correction.įor instance, we all know that South America is south of North America, of course. But these mental maps aren’t necessarily reliable. If you've ever wondered whether your country fits inside of a neighboring country or is bigger than one located across the globe, this fun tool will give you the answer.Most of us have a rough map of the world in our minds that we use any time we think about places. Plus, it reports the total area data you need to get a complete picture of the landmass you're examining. ![]() You're able to see the transformation that occurs as you drag a country away from its normal latitude, leaving little doubt about the size distortion that's caused by map projections. This site makes it easy to compare the size of one country to another with simple drag-and-drop operations. What does allow you to see the true size of a country is the website, The True Size Of…. Even the most widely used map projection, the Mercator, created in 1569 by a Flemish cartographer and geographer, Geradus Mercator distorts the poles greatly, and every feature away from the equator is not represented at its true size. A globe would give you a much better idea of relative country size, but why is that?When you try to take an image that’s stretched over a sphere and flatten it out, the image becomes distorted. ![]() How big is the country you live in compared to other countries? If you use a standard map to answer that question, you may get some misleading input. There's an awesome website called The True Size Of… that lets you drag and drop countries around the map to compare their relative size. The true size of Australia compared to the United States ![]()
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