• BakerBagel@midwest.social
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    1 day ago

    Nautical navigation is where the Mercator map is actually the most useful. Any straight line drawn in it stays true and any angles are preserved. That’s why every nautical chart is done using a Mercator projection. It’s just not so great when blown up to the size of the world, but that was never really it’s intention.

    • 7upCoconut@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      It was intentional as propaganda. During the Cold War, it made the U.S.S.R. look bigger and more of an imposing threat to the west.

      • btaf45@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        It was intentional as propaganda. During the Cold War,

        Nope. It is hundreds of years older that that.

        • 7upCoconut@lemmy.world
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          18 hours ago

          Yes it is older than that.

          That doesn’t discount the fact that it was selected for that purpose.

          • btaf45@lemmy.world
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            15 hours ago

            That doesn’t discount the fact that it was selected for that purpose.

            WTF of course it discounts the fact that it was “selected for that purpose”.