It's the world, Jim, but not as we know it

Click on a label to read posts from that part of the world.

Both the Wikipedia and everything2 have good entries on the Peters Projection, explaining that there are good reasons for why the Mercator projection is the standard projection. (They also counter the suggestion of Peters Projection advocates that the Mercator projection is standard for political reasons.) One advantage of the Mercator projection is that angles on the map equal angles in real life--with the Peters projection, this is only true N-S and E-W. Under the Peters projection, Africa appears to be twice as long N-S and E-W whereas in reality, the distances are about the same. So I think it's debatable whether the Peters projection shows the world as it "actually looks like" any more than the Mercator projection does.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peters_projection
http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=969034

Add your comments

Your comments:

Remember me

E-Mail me when someone replies to this comment

Please keep your comments relevant to this blog entry. Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments.

When you enter your name and email address, you'll be sent a link to confirm your comment, and a password. To leave another comment, just use that password.

To create a live link, simply type the URL (including http://) or email address and we will make it a live link for you. You can put up to 3 URLs in your comments. Line breaks and paragraphs are automatically converted — no need to use <p> or <br /> tags.