3 ms·

Levi Walter Yaggy’s Geographical Maps and Charts

31 points by benbreen 4y ago

IIAOPSW 4y ago
I have a bit of a map obsession right now. But I've put my finger on it. Really its an information obsession. There are pretty maps and there are informative maps. People often conflate these, thinking the prettier map is inherently better. The better map is the one that encodes the underlying patterns of information and makes them easy to spot. Assume you have a color space of only 1 bit of RGB information + 1 bit for dark/bright (if we're being realistic that's about the level of color information that you can quickly discern for two things that are not right next to each other). So if you can only show the person reading the map 4 bits of information, what do you show them? Some of these Yaggy maps are good maps. Especially the ones on the geological layers. The choice of which color gets assigned to which layer is consistent enough that your eye won't jump to the wrong one as you look around. You'll never be mislead about how deep something is. The climate and peoples chart is also a good map. It simplifies the world down to 5 basic clusters of physiology. That's just over 2 bits of information, and it makes the relation between physiology and climate very evident. If it tried to subdivide the world into more specific and/or accurate cultural details, rather than broad outlines of "races", the patterns of evolution which lead to these physical differences would be wholly obscured. The astronomy charts are more in the pretty category. What are these white borders he's drawn all over the sky and how do these subdivisions help me? I legit don't know. Overall, hit and miss for me. I suppose some of these are better called illustrations than maps.
- shrx 4y ago
  > The astronomy charts are more in the pretty category. What are these white borders he's drawn all over the sky and how do these subdivisions help me? I legit don't know. They are delimiting the constellations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAU_designated_constellations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAU_designated_constellations

31 points by benbreen 4y ago

I have a bit of a map obsession right now. But I've put my finger on it. Really its an information obsession. There are pretty maps and there are informative maps. People often conflate these, thinking the prettier map is inherently better. The better map is the one that encodes the underlying patterns of information and makes them easy to spot. Assume you have a color space of only 1 bit of RGB information + 1 bit for dark/bright (if we're being realistic that's about the level of color information that you can quickly discern for two things that are not right next to each other). So if you can only show the person reading the map 4 bits of information, what do you show them? Some of these Yaggy maps are good maps. Especially the ones on the geological layers. The choice of which color gets assigned to which layer is consistent enough that your eye won't jump to the wrong one as you look around. You'll never be mislead about how deep something is. The climate and peoples chart is also a good map. It simplifies the world down to 5 basic clusters of physiology. That's just over 2 bits of information, and it makes the relation between physiology and climate very evident. If it tried to subdivide the world into more specific and/or accurate cultural details, rather than broad outlines of "races", the patterns of evolution which lead to these physical differences would be wholly obscured. The astronomy charts are more in the pretty category. What are these white borders he's drawn all over the sky and how do these subdivisions help me? I legit don't know. Overall, hit and miss for me. I suppose some of these are better called illustrations than maps.

shrx 4y ago
> The astronomy charts are more in the pretty category. What are these white borders he's drawn all over the sky and how do these subdivisions help me? I legit don't know. They are delimiting the constellations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAU_designated_constellations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAU_designated_constellations