Artificial reality - The Visualization of Spatial Social Structure - page 60

be understood. We create artificial realities partly through necessity - reality
being too large, small or chaotic - but mainly to expedite understanding. In visu-
alization we enhance reality. 1 The most important decision in so doing concerns
what view of space to adopt as the basis for our pictures (Figure 3.1).
As the web expands and visual techniques develop, the contents of our imag-
inations are made visible to feed back into our minds and those of others in
great loops of creativity. The ability to share our thoughts so vividly will tax our
abilities to accept and cope with each other's artificial realities. Through seeing
how others see, we all change our views. 2

3.2 Abstract spaces

As a rule, the novel, dramatic character of cartograms may deceive
unwary map readers. Great care and skill must be exercised when
dealing with this particular type of map. The advantages of cartograms
are substantial enough, however, that geographers would do well to
gain sufficient sophistication to handle these maps effectively.
(Muehrcke, 1981, p. 27)

Viewed from a few hundred metres above the surface of the earth people appear
like ants, milling around aimlessly. Another few hundred metres and we cannot
see the people, only the buildings they have constructed, the land they had cleared
and the roads and bridges that connect and separate these things (Figure 3.2). A
few kilometres above the earth and all this evidence of human activity disappears;
viewed from space orbit with the human eye we can just make out the pyramids
of Egypt but not the Great Wall of China. We can see the blurs of a mega-city
but no detail and the fans of excessive soil erosion out of great deltas, but not
their upstream sources.
The creation of artificial spatial realities is necessary to our sense of self
importance, to not seeing ourselves as akin to grains of sand on a beach. We often
think that what we do is central to this world, that the thin slices of concrete we
have placed upon its soil is evidence of great achievement and that our impact
is of crucial importance to its future.
We may well be poisoning the air and oceans, but other than the smoke plume
from a zoomed-in-on industrial complex or an algae bloom downstream of an

1 'The map is not some inferior but more convenient substitute for a globe. Map projections are
not simply choices of lesser evils among distorting possibilities. On the contrary, the map allows
the geographer to twist space into the condition he wishes. For purposes of finding lines of constant
compass direction, the Mercator projection is far superior to the actual surface of the earth. The earth
itself lacks the spatial property of having such lines being straight lines' (Bunge, 1966, p. 238).
2 'We found that the most effective maps may not be the most realistic, but are those which
actually “distort” reality by eliminating information and by visually clarifying the topological and
functional connections among geographical entities (e.g., a pocket subway map)' (Mills, 1981,
p. 115).