I guess it's surprising because normally we look at the world region-by-different-sized-region rather than as a whole.
Peru represents probably a smaller percentage of the area of South America as a whole than the UK does of the area of Europe as a whole but if you stuck Peru in the middle of Europe it would look huge.
After the answer was given I popped on to Google Earth and tried to do a comparison flicking back and forth and it's like some kind of optical illusion as I still can't work out how to fit France and Germany into Peru
After the answer was given I popped on to Google Earth and tried to do a comparison flicking back and forth and it's like some kind of optical illusion as I still can't work out how to fit France and Germany into Peru
The other point to bear in mind, as someone else mentioned, is the distortion built into map projections.
After the answer was given I popped on to Google Earth and tried to do a comparison flicking back and forth and it's like some kind of optical illusion as I still can't work out how to fit France and Germany into Peru
If I remember correctly it's because maps are a representation of a curved surface mapped onto a flat one. Depending on how close countries are to the Equator/Poles their sizes get distorted to different degrees. Countries near the Equator are shrunk relative to those near the North and South poles.
This makes Peru appear smaller than it actually is comparing to the UK France and Germany
After the answer was given I popped on to Google Earth and tried to do a comparison flicking back and forth and it's like some kind of optical illusion as I still can't work out how to fit France and Germany into Peru
It's not an optical illusion, it's the Map projection distortion. Map projections have to make certain compromises in order to show information. Be it on line, on a globe, or in an Atlas.
For example on standard Mercator projection (I think) which is the most common - Greenland appears to be a similar or greater size to Africa, when in fact it's over 14 times smaller.
Gall-peters has different proportions, showing less distortion.
Comments
Laughing my head off at that:D:D:D
The other point to bear in mind, as someone else mentioned, is the distortion built into map projections.
Anyway I found these superimposed comparisons.
France vs Peru http://mapfight.appspot.com/fr-vs-pe/france-peru-size-comparison
Germany vs Peru http://mapfight.appspot.com/de-vs-pe/germany-peru-size-comparison
UK vs Peru http://mapfight.appspot.com/gb-vs-pe/united-kingdom-peru-size-comparison
If I remember correctly it's because maps are a representation of a curved surface mapped onto a flat one. Depending on how close countries are to the Equator/Poles their sizes get distorted to different degrees. Countries near the Equator are shrunk relative to those near the North and South poles.
This makes Peru appear smaller than it actually is comparing to the UK France and Germany
It's not an optical illusion, it's the Map projection distortion. Map projections have to make certain compromises in order to show information. Be it on line, on a globe, or in an Atlas.
For example on standard Mercator projection (I think) which is the most common - Greenland appears to be a similar or greater size to Africa, when in fact it's over 14 times smaller.
Gall-peters has different proportions, showing less distortion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Map_projection