How massive is Greenland, actually? Your map could also be deceiving you : NPR

[ad_1] <img src="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims3/default/strip/false/crop/1600x878+0+359/resize/1100/quality/50/format/png/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F9c%2F7b%2Fc5f737cb4562bcdeb6eb6a4fc5c4%2Fgreenland-maps.png" data-template="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims3/default/strip/false/crop/1600x878+0+359/resize/{width}/quality/{quality}/format/{format}/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F9c%2F7b%2Fc5f737cb4562bcdeb6eb6a4fc5c4%2Fgreenland-maps.png" class="img" alt="These maps show two different approaches to depicting Greenland. The left map is an orthographic projection, emulating a globe. The right map is a Mercator projection, which exaggerates the sizes of landmasses — including Greenland — that are closest to the poles." fetchpriority="high"/> These maps present two completely different approaches to depicting Greenland. The left map is an orthographic projection, emulating a globe. The appropriate map is a Mercator projection, which exaggerates the sizes of landmasses — together with Greenland — which can be closest to the poles. Alyson Harm/NPR disguise caption

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Alyson Harm/NPR President Trump is once more floating the concept of annexing Greenland, the semiautonomous Arctic island that may be a territory of Denmark.

Greenland's location between North America and Russia provides it strategic worth for the U.S., which already has a navy base there. "We do want Greenland, completely," Trump mentioned on Sunday. "We want it for protection."

If all this discuss makes you wish to try Greenland on a map, you may discover its dimension. Greenland is the world's largest island, masking greater than 836,000 sq. miles.

However is Greenland actually as massive as it'd seem on a map? Seems, it depends upon the map.

Although globes supply a fairly correct image of the world's geography, issues get rather a lot trickier if you attempt to depict a sphere on a two-dimensional floor. The styles and sizes of land lots can get distorted, and distances and instructions threat turning into wonky. There are numerous several types of world maps, and every one has its strengths and weaknesses.

Probably the most frequent map sorts is named the Mercator projection, named for the Sixteenth-century Flemish cartographer who invented it. That is the one you might have seen in an atlas as a child, and a model of it's utilized in on-line mapping instruments comparable to Google Maps.

Mercator's map takes the Earth's latitudes and longitudes (parallels and meridians) — which curve across the spherical globe — and makes them straight strains.

This allowed sailors to plot a course between any two factors utilizing a straight line, but it surely additionally created distortions within the map the additional you bought from the equator. For instance, Greenland seems roughly the identical dimension because the continent of Africa on a Mercator map, despite the fact that Africa is about 14 instances bigger.

"Mathematically [the parallels and meridians] get pulled aside, pulled in numerous quantities and magnitudes from the equator in the direction of the poles, so you find yourself with this form of exaggerated impact, if you'll, within the higher latitudes the place landmasses look big," mentioned Fritz Kessler, a Penn State geography professor and map projection skilled.

There have been organized efforts to maneuver away from the Mercator projection and use options that provide a extra correct view of relative land dimension. The Robinson projection, which tries to raised steadiness the dimensions and shapes of land lots, sought to unravel the "Greenland downside." And final yr, the African Union threw its assist behind a push to exchange Mercator with the Equal Earth map, which higher renders the continent's scale.

However which of the quite a few map projections you choose at a given time actually depends upon what you are utilizing the map for, in keeping with Kessler.

"Is it going for use to measure distances or instructions? Angles? Areas? Present distributions of thematic information, you recognize, inhabitants?" he mentioned. "There's lots of of projections that can be utilized, and the truth that we concentrate on only a very slender subset is I feel one other downside that ought to be addressed."