Editing 2577: Sea Chase
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==Explanation== | ==Explanation== | ||
− | + | {{incomplete|Created by a FLATTENED OBLATE SPHEROID - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}} | |
− | + | In this comic, Randall returns to one of his pet subjects: [[977: Map Projections|map projections]]. Unusually, this time it is from the perspective of people living - or, in this case, sailing - upon the world that is quite literally being mapped. | |
− | + | Two sailing ships, of circa 18th century design, are engaged in a close chase across the {{w|Atlantic}}, the aggressor flying the Skull And Cross-Bones of a stereotypical pirate vessel. The ship being chased, however, has a plan to escape. And the means to do so. At a crucial moment, [[Cueball]] is told to flip an incongruous large switch that (like several [[1620: Christmas Settings|other]] [[1763: Catcalling|artefacts]] in Randall's universe) alters the nature of their reality. | |
− | + | Whereas beforehand the world is directly represented upon a simply contiguous map, the {{w|Robinson projection}}, it is now changed to one (which is actually the new reality) known as {{w|Goode homolosine projection|Goode Homolosine}} in which the flattening of the world mitigates localised warping of angle/distance/area by introducing discontinuities in relatively 'unused' parts of the mapped world, such as the centre of the Atlantic. | |
− | + | By precisely timing the change (as they cross a particular {{w|meridian}}, possibly the 40°W one), they leave the pursuer now on the wrong side of the very real gap, allowing the pursued ship to escape whatever fate they were trying to avoid. Though there is still an oceanic connection, it requires sailing down the edge towards the tropics, rounding this particular rent in the planet's surface and heading back up the other side. This is vastly further than Cueball's ship needs to travel to reach (presumably) any European port in which they can safely moor. | |
− | The | + | The title text elaborates on the policies of the black-flagged ship: crewmates are never to look into the "projection abyss" and to never hit the red button labeled "DYMAXION." |
− | + | The first rule suggests that changing the projection of physical reality produces a gap in reality, a void. This may be dangerous to gaze into or simply unnerving to crewmates, hence the rule. | |
− | The second rule references a button that seems to do the same thing as the lever but changes the world into a {{w|Dymaxion map|Dymaxion projection}} | + | The second rule references a button that seems to do the same thing as the lever but changes the world into a "Dymaxion" projection. The {{w|Dymaxion map|Dymaxion projection}} is somewhat notorious for projecting the globe of the Earth in a manner that creates sections of triangles in the effort to preserve land scale as much as possible, bucking the trend of most map projections in causing land masses and their relationships to each other to become more warped in various ways (length, area and/or angle) but at least be trivially connected to each other. |
− | + | For the Dymaxion (a portmaneau of "dynamic", "maximum" and "tension") the necessary discontinuities would be even more strange and mind-bending than with the 'interrupted' Goode Homolosine, so turning the world into this projection may be bad, and a good reason to create a rule against pressing the button in question. | |
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==Transcript== | ==Transcript== | ||
− | + | {{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}} | |
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{{comic discussion}} | {{comic discussion}} | ||
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[[Category:Maps]] | [[Category:Maps]] | ||
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