Читать книгу Geography For Dummies - Jerry T. Mitchell - Страница 52

Both relative location and absolute location have the potential of getting the stranger to the desired destination. And chances are you have used both types of location to direct someone to a destination in your town, neighborhood, or environs.

But in a global context, absolute location is far superior to relative location. When you think about it, the task of directing somebody to a location halfway around the world by means of relative location (for example, “Go that way 11,238 miles and turn right”) is rather mind-boggling. And even if you could do it, that information would only work at the one location where that information was given. It would be far better if every place on Earth had an absolute location such as that hospital in Gridville. Of course, that would be contingent on the existence of a global grid that basically mimics what we’ve seen in Gridville. Fortunately, such a grid exists.