3 ms·

You can see rivers, mountain ranges, coasts, valleys and walls. But you can't see national borders, although you can sometimes see things that indicate their ap

by ktizo 15y ago

You can see rivers, mountain ranges, coasts, valleys and walls. But you can't see national borders, although you can sometimes see things that indicate their approximate currently agreed location, especially where the border has stayed fixed for long enough. But the border can always change tomorrow, or even be in two or more places at once as neighbours do not always agree on such things.

zalew 15y ago
> You can see rivers, mountain ranges, coasts, valleys and walls. But you can't see national borders, Actually, sometimes you can http://blogs.nasa.gov/cm/blog/fragileoasis/posts/post_1315437313039.html http://blogs.nasa.gov/cm/blog/fragileoasis/posts/post_131543... (definitely worth a read)
- ktizo 15y ago
  I'd say that he is seeing the physical representation of a border, the border itself being, of necessity, infinitely thin, and therefore very difficult to observe even when fairly close.
mc32 15y ago
>But the border can always change tomorrow, or even be in two or more places at once as neighbours do not always agree on such things. That's true about borders and about many other things in life. Things change in life. We get older every day and thus change. If I took your stance on borders and applied it to a life, I could say, life is uncertain because we are in constant change. Yet, we exist and we plan and so on because we expect there to be some dependability (on things continuing as we know them, for the time being). Just because border lines on maps are the abstract representation of actual boders doesn't mean they do not exist or there is ambiguity about them. With satellite technology and telemetry, borders are pretty exact --with some disputed exceptions. Numbers also don't "exist" in real form, but we know they "exist" and are quite real in other ways.
- ktizo 15y ago
  The real numbers might be said to exist in real form. My point with borders is that most of their existence is imaginary, this doesn't mean that they don't exist, but rather that they only exist through social agreement and are largely metaphorical in nature.

by ktizo 15y ago

zalew 15y ago

> You can see rivers, mountain ranges, coasts, valleys and walls. But you can't see national borders, Actually, sometimes you can http://blogs.nasa.gov/cm/blog/fragileoasis/posts/post_1315437313039.html http://blogs.nasa.gov/cm/blog/fragileoasis/posts/post_131543... (definitely worth a read)

ktizo 15y ago
I'd say that he is seeing the physical representation of a border, the border itself being, of necessity, infinitely thin, and therefore very difficult to observe even when fairly close.

mc32 15y ago

>But the border can always change tomorrow, or even be in two or more places at once as neighbours do not always agree on such things. That's true about borders and about many other things in life. Things change in life. We get older every day and thus change. If I took your stance on borders and applied it to a life, I could say, life is uncertain because we are in constant change. Yet, we exist and we plan and so on because we expect there to be some dependability (on things continuing as we know them, for the time being). Just because border lines on maps are the abstract representation of actual boders doesn't mean they do not exist or there is ambiguity about them. With satellite technology and telemetry, borders are pretty exact --with some disputed exceptions. Numbers also don't "exist" in real form, but we know they "exist" and are quite real in other ways.

ktizo 15y ago
The real numbers might be said to exist in real form. My point with borders is that most of their existence is imaginary, this doesn't mean that they don't exist, but rather that they only exist through social agreement and are largely metaphorical in nature.