When Maps Become The World

Description

Map making and, ultimately, map thinking is ubiquitous across literature, cosmology, mathematics, psychology, and genetics. We partition, summarize, organize, and clarify our world via spatialized representations. Our maps and, more generally, our representations seduce and persuade; they build and destroy. They are the ultimate record of empires and of our evolving comprehension of our world. This book is about the promises and perils of map thinking. Maps are purpose-driven abstractions, discarding detail to highlight only particular features of a territory. By preserving certain features at the expense of others, they can be used to reinforce a privileged position. When Maps Become the World shows us how the scientific theories, models, and concepts we use to intervene in the world function as maps, and explores the consequences of this, both good and bad. We increasingly understand the world around us in terms of models, to the extent that we often take the models for reality. Winther explains how in time, our historical representations in science, in cartography, and in our stories about ourselves replace individual memories and become dominant social narratives—they become reality, and they can remake the world. Contents......Page 8 Preface......Page 12 1. Introduction: Why Maps?......Page 20 The Nature of Map Thinking......Page 23 Elements of Map Thinking......Page 24 Deep Mapping......Page 25 Five Hundred Years of Western Mapping......Page 26 Cartography Meets GIS......Page 28 A Definition Based on Representation......Page 29 Characterizations Based on Process and Function......Page 32 Waldseemüller’s Map......Page 34 Guaman Poma’s Countermap......Page 37 Van Sant’s Ultimate Map?......Page 42 Conclusion......Page 43 Part 1: Philosophy......Page 46 2. Theory Is to World as Map Is to Territory......Page 48 Analogy......Page 49 Three Types of Analogy......Page 50 Critical Cautions......Page 53 The Map Analogy......Page 54 A Typology of Map Analogies......Page 55 Uses of the Map Analogy in Humanistic Inquiry......Page 59 Assumption Archaeology......Page 71 Conclusion......Page 75 3. From Abstraction to Ontologizing......Page 78 The Abstraction-Ontologizing Account......Page 79 Abstraction Stage I: Calibration of Units and Coordinates......Page 80 Abstraction Stage II: Data Collection and Management......Page 86 Abstraction Stage III: Generalization......Page 88 Ontologizing......Page 100 Ontologizing 0: Representation Testing......Page 101 Ontologizing I: Changing the World......Page 103 Ontologizing II: Understanding the World......Page 104 Ontologizing III: Classroom Communication......Page 105 Conclusion......Page 106 4. Long Live Contextual Objectivity!......Page 108 Pernicious Reification......Page 109 Conformation......Page 114 The Essential Indexical......Page 116 Mercator’s Critique of Earlier Projections......Page 118 Mercator’s New Purpose: Navigation......Page 119 Mercator’s Clear Presentation of Latitude and Longitude......Page 120 A History of the Mercator Projection II: Post Mercator......Page 121 Integration Platforms......Page 126 A Beyond-Mercator Integration Platform: Blocking Pernicious Reification and Seeking Contextual Objectivity......Page 127 Philosophical Aspects of Integration Platforms......Page 131 Conclusion......Page 135 5. Projecting Maps into Our Worlds......Page 138 Two Canonical Philosophical Accounts of Representation: Isomorphism and Similarity......Page 139 The Isomorphism Account......Page 140 The Similarity Account......Page 143 The Multiple Representations Account......Page 158 Ontologizing......Page 160 Merely-Seeing-As......Page 165 Pluralistic Ontologizing......Page 166 Climate Change and Multiple Representations......Page 169 Conclusion......Page 172 Part 2: Science......Page 178 6. Mapping Space......Page 180 The Universe’s Baby Portrait......Page 181 The Universe Growing Up (and Outward)......Page 183 Cosmic-Scale Maps and the Abstraction-Ontologizing Account......Page 186 Literal Cartographic Maps in Geology......Page 190 State-Space Maps in Physics and Physical Chemistry......Page 196 Analogous Maps in Mathematics......Page 200 Conclusion......Page 205 7. Mapping Ourselves......Page 208 Migration Maps......Page 211 Arrowized Assumptions......Page 212 Arrowized Maps......Page 213 Countermapping Migration......Page 216 Brain Maps......Page 218 Decompositional Assumptions......Page 219 Phrenological Maps......Page 222 The Somatosensory and Motor Homunculi......Page 223 Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI)......Page 225 Countermapping the Brain......Page 226 Statistical Causal Maps......Page 230 Linear Model Assumptions......Page 231 “Genetic” and “Environmental” Diseases......Page 233 Path Diagrams as Statistical Causal Maps......Page 235 When Causal Maps Become the World......Page 237 Conclusion......Page 239 8. Mapping Genetics......Page 242 Assumptions......Page 244 Map Types......Page 245 The Linear Genetic Map......Page 246 Linear Genetic Maps of Phenotypic Linkage......Page 247 Linear Genetic Maps of Nucleotides......Page 253 Assumptions of the Linear Genetic Map......Page 254 The Gene Expression Map......Page 255 The Genotype-Phenotype Map......Page 256 The Literal Cartographic Genetic Map......Page 258 The Comparative Genetic Map......Page 260 The Adaptive Landscape Map......Page 262 Darwin’s Hypothesis......Page 265 Contemporary Phylogenies......Page 269 Future Extensions: Mapping Genetics as a Paradigmatic Integration Platform......Page 270 9. Map Thinking Science and Philosophy......Page 274 Existence, World Making, and Responsibility......Page 275 Map Thinking Scientific Methodology......Page 280 Map Thinking Philosophical Methodology......Page 282 Tracking Ethics and Power......Page 283 Imagining “What If . . . ?”......Page 284 An Invitation to Dream......Page 285 Appendix: Cognitive Map Exercise......Page 288 References......Page 292 Index......Page 334