青山学院大英米文a方式
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1.Our mental maps tend to ( ).
①self-correct easily once we find out the truth
②have errors that others share
③get more reliable as time goes by
④be identical to the mental maps of animals
- Nelson believes that people often think that South America is directly under North America partly due to their ( ).
①names ②sizes ③shapes ④maps
- John Nelson and his parents were ( ).
①never able to have conversations over dinner
②concerned that maps simplified reality too much
③interested in mistaken ideas about geography
④disappointed that they never traveled to South America
- A common misconception is that Europe ( ).
①lines up better with Canada than with the United States
②cannot line up with any other continent
③is across the Atlantic Ocean from the United States
④is further south than it is
- Despite how far north it extends, Europe is relatively warm due to ( ).
①how near it is to the lower 48 US states
②its average temperature of 48°
③the Gulf Stream
④the warmth of the Mexican people
- When flattening a three-dimensional globe to make a convenient flat map ( ).
①irregularities will disappear
②the earth will look more curvy
③the expensive globe will be ruined
④inaccuracies will appear
- People often find- it surprising that ( ).
①Brazil is almost as big as Canada
②Alaska is next to Canada
③Alaska is bigger than Libya
④Greenland cannot be found on most maps
- The shortest way to get from Washington, D.C. to Shanghai would be to fly ( ).
①west, over the continental United States and Pacific Ocean
②over the North Pole
③over the Atlantic Ocean and the continental United States
④east, over Greenland
- Mental maps ( ).
①are as complicated as the world actually is
②cannot be as useful as a summary of the geography
③tend to be more complicated than subway maps
④can be more useful than precise geographical reality
- Geographers tend to ( ).
①lack mental maps
②intentional1y fool people
③also have inaccurate mental maps
④prefer living in cities with subways
＜スクリプト＞
Most of us have a rough map of the world in our minds that we use any time we think about places. But these mental maps aren’t necessarily reliable. In fact, many of the maps in our heads share the same errors, some of which are quite large – and surprisingly resistant to correction.
For instance, we all know that South America is south of North America, of course. But you may be surprised by the fact that virtually the entire South American continent is east of the US state of Florida, which is on the East Coast of the US. There we lots of possible reasons for mistaken ideas about geography like this one, says map maker John Nelson. According to Nelson, mental maps are necessarily simplifications, and Nelson suspects the misplaced Americas may be partly a result of their names. After all, it’s not called Southeast America; it’s called South America.
Nelson’s father, who was a geography professor, wrote a paper on mistaken ideas about geography with some of his colleagues and advice from Nelson’s mother, a high-school geography teacher. “I actually remember them talking about this research paper over diners when I was younger,” Nelson says.
North Americans tend to place Europe much farther south on their mental maps than it really is, placing it directly across the Atlantic from the United States. But it actually lines up better with Canada.
Nelson suspects that climate might play a role in this mistaken idea because Western Europe is warmer than Canada, despite its relatively northward position on the globe, thanks to an ocean current called the Gulf Stream, which brings warmer water from the Gulf of Mexico across the Atlantic and gives Europe its mild climate. The warmer temperatures are more similar to the climate of the lower 48 US states than Canada’s.
Locations aren’t the only way our mental maps can be wrong; we also have mistaken notions about the relative size of things. This may be due in part to the nature of flat maps. Flattening a three-dimensional, or 3D, globe onto a flat surface isn’t possible without some change, which might not reflect reality. This is especially true for maps that use certain projections – ways of representing the Earth’s curved surface on a flat map – the kind that can be found on the walls of classrooms.
While you may have already been aware that Greenland’s size is represented extremely inaccurately on some maps, other kinds of inaccuracies are more surprising. For example, Brazil isn’t that impressive on many maps, but in reality, it’s bigger than the entire United States (if we exclude Alaska and Hawaii) and almost as large as Canada. Also, Alaska, which is a giant on many maps, is actually a little smaller than Libya. Thinking about the world in two dimensions gives us mistaken ideas about how to get from one place to another. If you draw a line on a flat map from Washington D.C. to Shanghai, China, the most direct route appears to be west over the United States and the Pacific Ocean. But many of us have been on flights to Asia where people are surprised to hear the pilot say they’ll be flying over the North Pole. When looking at a globe instead of a flat map, it makes sense though. That’s far and away the shortest way to get there.
None of these mistaken ideas would be surprising for a student to have on the first day of geography class, but even once we’ve learned the truth, the errors on our mental maps tend to persist. One reason for this may be that our way of viewing the world is basically a summary of its actual geography. The mental map is a simplification, similar to the subway map of New York City. Sometimes getting close to the reality of the world, but not capturing it precisely, is often more useful and practical.
Mental map errors are so widespread that even professionals have them. A 1985 study of mental world maps found that geographers had the same mistaken ideas about the relative position of cities in North America and Europe as everybody else. If those who create and study maps are fooled, it’s not surprising that the rest of us are too.
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