Why is North up?

[Sam Slater]

I heard you first time Wazza..........!laugh!

Forgot about the north star not being visable in Oz... (certain times of the year it's visable due to the Earth's tilt. !oops!)

I think you're going to have it 'all on' explaining the upside down map to the girls mate.

[Sam Slater]

It's found me well BeestonBoy. And thank you for referring to me by my managerial name! !laugh!

[BeestonBoy]

I feel like Ralph Wigum now!!

Gonna put this one to bed untill im sober!!

[jj]

Sam Slater wrote:
< if the Australian Aborigines were the first seafaring explorers, and map makers...
They'd have selected, to navigate by, a star that lay more or less over the
South Pole [they wouldn't be able to see thr Northern Hemisphere], i.e.
one that repeated observation showed didn't 'move' across the sky over
the course of the night, one that all the other stars appeared to rotate
around. They might well then call it the 'North Pole', [or possibly
worraworragumbidgeeboogoo] and deem any movement in a direction
apparently away from it to be 'down', or 'South'.

Reference-points, cooordinates......

[jj]

Have you thought how to explain the massive exaggeration of Greenland
and the minimisation of Africa in Mercator's projection? I always found
that a little tough to grasp....

[jj]

Actually, Adam Hart-Davis does this quite well, now I recall.

[jj]

I've now been up for 21 hours [without a drink, too], and I'm brain-dead.
Goodnight.

[Deano!]

warren zevon rip wrote:

> Sam Slater wrote:
>
>
> > And anyway, even if the Australian Aborigines were the first
> > seafaring explorers, and map makers; if they'd used the north
> > star as a reference point, maps would probably still be as we
> > know them today.
>
> Forgive my ignorance, but would they have seen the North star?
> And even so, would it then still be the North star?

To my knowledge ( and I'm an Aussie so its pretty limited ) our Aboriginals produced no maps and had no written lanuage.

>
> > Why would Australians want an upside down map anyway? What
> > disadvantaged position are they in being near the bottom of
> > maps?

It sounds like an idea from some academic wanker who thinks that by showing a map upside down it will -
"symbolise the bold new thinking of a society that has thrown off historical conformaties" etc.