Guest Disagrees with Matt... So Matt Calls Jimmy Akin w/ Charbel Raish 

Matt is right. One of my favourite stories of teaching maths is where I flipped the diagram 45 degrees, and said, "This makes the problem so much easier to solve." My student's jaw dropped. "You can DO that?" Always ask: What nuance am I myself imposing on this situation?

Matt's right... I'm actually shocked everyone else is having a hard time with this. 😂😂😂😂🤦‍♂️😭

As an Aussie, I would like to say that Australia isn't "Down Under" - It's "Up Over"!

Matt is wrong. I didn't study physics but I'm biased and don't want Australians to start a revolution, er, a prison riot I suppose.

I sort of knew the answer already, that map orientation was arbitrary, but the detail that Jimmy Akin went into off the cuff and the precision of his answer was impressive. Really added value to the discussion.

Respectfully, that "you'd have to send the spaceship out upside down" made me chuckle a bit

Matt is correct. I studied engineering and in Physics class we learned that there is not a solid reference point for directions. All of this is defined referentially to how we want to depict reality. Additionally, there is no cardinal points in the universe, and no edges… if you get in a spaceship and travel in any direction to find the edge, you will end up by reaching the starting point…

Jimmy is just so wicked smart! He would be my phone-a-friend if I were to find myself as a contestant on a game show.

I got Matt’s point immediately. I don’t see why it’s hard to fathom. I’m in Victoria . If I was at the bass straight swimming with no sight of any land. And I believed I was heading north and hit Tasmania. That would be north for me. That’s on the premise that maps never suggested what’s north or south. The compass points to north only cause we call it north . We could easily call it south.

And one day soon, Matt shall realize that Ohio is truly the center of the universe. As the saying goes, "Ohio, the heart of it all."

He's saying that if Australia invented the compass, they would've called the South Pole the North Pole... In space there is no up and down

Had same conversation with my brother 10 years ago! He had a guest house in Scotland. After a few beers I persuaded him to turn his map of Scotland upside down (relative to the accepted convention). He left it that way and regularly had to politely explain his reasoning to guests who pointed out that his map was upside down.

You should invite Edward Feser as well. The man is just a damn intelligent Catholic Philosopher.

I adore how random this segment is 😂

Now Australia looks like a fluffy cat standing on the shelf!

Mr. Raish is like "what did i get myself into"

FUN FACT: every civilization drew maps as we do. Somehow all of them chose what is north up and south down. Ive heard it somewhere and i looked at ancient maps and it appears to be the case.

Things are so upside down nowadays, maybe if we collectively decide to just flip earth right now, our reality will also flip :)

Interesting discussion. What I stumbled upon is that very early "western" maps were already north-up. By western I mean from Mesopotamia and Babylon westward.

What about the magnetic pole? I know we could have called south north and North south but the magnetic pole does make a distinction between the poles like Jimmy had mentioned in regards to east and west.

The reference point goes back to the magnetic poles of the earth. North: the magnetic lines comes out of the end and begin to wrap around the earth. South: the magnetic lines go back into the earth. The magnetic north pole is close to what we have subjectively defined as the geographic north pole. That's why north is north. If during the creation of the compass they had defined north as being where the lines go into the earth then yes what we know as north would become south

It’s really good I don’t have Jimmy Akin’s cell number or I would be doing this all the time

I LOVE JIMMY! HE'S A WALKING ENCYCLOPEDIA! SO SMART! SO KIND! BEST PERSON TO CALL!

I have often wondered how much Jimmy Akin has to prepare before answering the weird and random questions he gets asked on weird question hours and the like, seems to confirm here that he is quite capable of off the cuffing stuff.

Matt is correct. I studied physics, and I’m good at visualizing and manipulating things in space in my mind. Matt has it. To complicate it further and add to Jimmy’s answer: the rotation of the earth has an angular momentum that, in the standard right-hand coordinate system, points to what we call the North. On the other hand (pun), the choice of the right- vs. left-hand coordinate system is also arbitrary, and it only matters that one always uses the same coordinate system throughout one’s calculations. One could use a left-hand system that has the angular momentum point south, but right was chosen first (presumably by the majority right-handed people) just as the maps directions were determined by the first to define them.

I think we need to break out a model globe and popsicle stick figures.

It’s been awhile since I’ve listened to Jimmy Akins Mysterious world... and now I have to go listen to him next. 🤣

"That's it! I'm calling Jimmy!"😂😂😂

When you flipped Australia upside down I thought you were going to say that it looked like America

In a sphere every cardinal point could be marked as North, it depends on the point of view. You can say a point of reference, as in that case the reference is you. You can say front is North, so back is South, and so on. And to be consistent, you have to use some other references to get it right every other time. You can use the environment around to mark directions relative to what you defined as cardinal points, or you can also create an artificial tool that will give you reference for each point.

A lot of older maps are oriented with the east upwards, which makes a certain kind of intuitive sense. The oldest map of Virginia is oriented with the west up. I have suspicions about the motive for the latter being to encourage further exploration, but that is just a guess.

What about magnetic north? A compass doesn't point to the south pole.

Matt you are correct! In space there is no up or down.

no one mentioned the magnetic field that somewhat defines north? Although to be fair, it does shift and move around and is therefore not exactly geographic north. The answer really has more to do with what is "up" and what is "down". Down is towards the center of the earth, which doesnt really make sense when you're looking at a projection of earth in space, in that case "down" is just whichever direction is down relative to your eyes.

This video was a great break from all the chaos. Thank you.

compasses point to "true north". It just so happened Europe was in the northern hemisphere as well. So it made sense to make the map that way. If Australia had started exploring first, it would still make sense that they would place themselves at the top but your compass would always point away from you. To what would now be called "True South"

To be fair, 90% of the world population lives in the Northern Hemisphere, so don't put all the blame on the Europeans for putting the north on top. Also Jupiter would just look weird with the great red spot in its upper half.

According to Wikipedia in its article on "North": "The notion that north should always be "up" and east at the right was established by the Greek astronomer Ptolemy. The historian Daniel Boorstin suggests that perhaps this was because the better-known places in his world were in the northern hemisphere, and on a flat map these were most convenient for study if they were in the upper right-hand corner." This seems similar to the bias in Cartesian/analytic geometry, where the more commonly used numbers (i.e., the positive numbers) are positioned in the upper-right corner portion of the plane relative to the origin.

True North, magnetic pulse. North is always North. You can also use the stars, the North Star. Just listened to Jimmy Aiken I guess I'm wrong LOL.

My theory is most maps were drawn after the invention of the compass, which points to what we call north, so maps were drawn to reflect this point of reference as “up” on a piece of paper. That’s why most maps have a compass rose that denote these directions. The magnetic polarity of the earth is objective and our ability to detect that polarity is a physical reality in the compass. I once read that some maps before this would draw the direction that the sun “rose” as “up” . I don’t think the Europeans just thought they were on top of the world, why not the center? We should look at maps from other people that predate advanced European civilization .

Is there something Jimmy Akin doesn’t know?

"Youd have to send the satellite up upside down" 🤣

north and south is in reference to earths rotation, but wich to call north and south is arbitrary

You gotta start with “what is up?” In space there is no “up”. There are north and south poles, but it doesn’t matter which way is up. If you flip the map upside down and call south north, it’s still a correct map, and Australia is north, hence Matt’s first point

Jimmy Akin is the best ! He’s dialed in. God Bless !

What an EPIC crossover event 😂If reincarnation was real, I would be convinced that Jimmy is St. Thomas Aquinas reincarnated 😜I love both Pints With Aquinas and Jimmy Akin's Mysterious World. Keep up the great work, and may God bless you!

But what about the north pole? Isn't it magnetically stronger than the south axis point, hence how we can make compasses which point north? Sure, if Australia colonized the world, we might say it made sense that compasses point 'down', since things get pulled DOWN by gravity, but there is an objective difference betwee north and south.

Yes. Europeans made the maps and they prioritized what they knew first as the top. We think up on a map is north and down is south because it’s the how we first experienced it.

“Just send the satellite up!”… what?… The fact that an educated adult thinks there’s an objective “up” for an object floating in space is mind boggling. This is primary school level stuff.

An upside down Australia looks like America (the contiguous states) the morning after a night of heavy partying.

Maps are oriented with north at the top because compasses point north.

I'm pretty sure the solar plane, which relates fairly closely to our poles, is actually perpendicular to the galactic plane so there's not really a direct relation between our north and galactic North

The fist compass pointed to the south because it was made in China.

Ancient maps of Israel have the same choice of directions (their north is our north, their south is our south), but not the same orientation - north is not at the top of the map. For them, the top of the map was east, so that the sea was at the bottom, if I remember right.

Why did nobody talk about the fact that australia south-side-up looks like a cute running dog.

I am amazed by the brilliance of this Matt Fradd!

Australia looks like a fluffy dog the way Matt placed it. Maybe like a fluffy terrier or something. 😂

Jimmy is the man!!!!!

I agree with Matt, the idea of the orientation of the map being objective is not true

They would probably still look the same since the maps were navigational based around Polaris

North and south also have to do with the rotation of the earth on its axis. I guess you could flip them, but you wouldn’t put the poles at some point east vs west.

Well of course! And if the axis of the spinning earth changed so that it were aligned with the current equator, then the "North-South" axis would become "East-West." That could possibly really drastically alter the appearance of the direction of sunrise and sunset.

I agree with Matt’s assessment of the relative locations of north and south.

Has no one ever heard of a compass? There is such a thing as magnetic north so we'd still draw maps relative to magnetic north

If the North pole were to be South, would the clock direction now be counter-clock-wise? Toilet water drains counter-clock-wise now in "southern" hemisphere.

It would the greatest exposition in our age to find all Jimmy Akin-like around the Globe. I'm sure there is in every country.

This is taught in middle school geography. I'm shocked that no on on the set knew this and were amazed that Jimmy would know it.

Ok, let's be clear about this. #1 - The concept of "top" and "bottom" does not come from the map. It is a concept which existed long before people knew anything about the continents, or the poles etc. The concept of top and bottom is not arbitrary. The application of the concept of top and bottom to a map is metaphorical. You don't literally go "up" when you go north, and you don't go "down" when you go south, though people use that convention of speech sometimes. The real question is not about the names "north" and "south", but about the cultural concept of which is top and which is bottom. #2 - You can say the names north and south are arbitrary, but only really if you want to say that all names are arbitrary, in the sense that they could have been called something else. Whatever you want to call them, the fact is that there are two opposite poles on the earth. One set of the poles can be thought of as the axis around which the earth rotates. This set of poles is abstract, and thus could be interchangeable (as in there is no physical difference between them). However the earth also has magnetic poles, which are not exactly interchangeable. Magnetic poles come in opposite pairs and they have real physical properties, which is why compasses work. #3 - The orientation of maps could be done differently, but it is also not entirely arbitrary. One directional axis (east-west) is in the direction of the earth's spin. The other directional axis is perpendicular to the earth's spin. Further, while you could flip which pole we consider to be the "top" and which pole we consider to be the "bottom" the fact that the top and the bottom are at the poles, is not arbitrary. The reason why the poles are thought of as top and bottom is because they are the "fixed" points around which everything else moves. If you take a ball and spin it on the ground, it would have a top and a bottom that are perpendicular to the rotational axis, one would be at the bottom touching the ground and the other would be at the top farthest away from the ground. You could argue that since the ball itself does not have a top or bottom defined by its own nature, that this usage of terms is arbitrary, however, it is accurately describing something that results from the nature of motion and physics. #4 - While it is true that if history had gone differently, south may have been the top and north the bottom, it is not true that this simply results from Europeans thinking of their area as the top or picking the pole closest to themselves. There are two major reasons why the convention of north being up/top happened. First, it is instructive to note that this was not a universal European convention. In the Middle Ages it was actually more common to put east at the top of maps, probably due to the religious significance of east, and sunrise. The convention of putting north at the top didn't develop until the Age of Exploration in the 1500's. The first reason why north became the top of maps is because the boom in map making that came with the age of sea-faring exploration followed on the heals of the Renaissance when European scholars were obsessed with Classical history and learning. Thus most of the cartographers based their convention on the ancient Ptolemaic map of the world. That map had north as the top of the map. No one really knows why the Ptolemaic map (made in Egypt in the 2nd Century AD) put north on top of the map, but the European map makers followed that convention, and as a result it became standard. The second is that navigation in the northern hemisphere depended heavily on Polaris, the northern pole star. Compasses on their own could be seen to point either south or north (or both), but the use of Polaris set north specifically as the primary reference point for navigation. So... to sum up... Prior to the age when sea-faring navigation became important, maps had different orientations often depending more on the religious or cultural notions of the people. Like the significance of east. Once sea-faring navigation became vitally important, maps needed to standardize and the picked an orientation that came from ancient classical knowledge, and also worked effectively with the navigational tools that were available at the time. Yes, it could have been different, no it was not totally arbitrary. While south could be the top of the globe and north could be the bottom of the globe, those two locations are not arbitrary. They have real properties that set them apart from everywhere else on earth.

Interesting discussion. If someone believes map alone, will say that it is clearly north is up and south is down.

Jimmy is gonna be the patron saint of knowledge one day

Who is to say that the world rotates on a horizontal instead of vertical axis.

Jimmy is amazing.

In the famous "Blue Marble" photo of the Earth taken on Apollo 17, the South Pole was on the top of the original image. It was rotated 180 degrees for publishing so that north would be on top. Remember, there is no inherent up or down in outer space. It's all just relative to your own frame of reference.

Mr. Akins has no equal.

LOL. No Matt because of the Axis line, we know what North and South is, it is not because of who drew the map. LOLOL

Have you thought of getting Ryan Montgomery on? He’s dedicated his life to hacking into sites and exposing sexual predators

No it wouldn't. Astronomers always thought positive rotation was counter clockwise around the sun, thus what is north still would have been north

If Australia is indeed turned upside down, would your toilets still spin the wrong way?

Upside down Australia looks like the US with big Florida, a gargantuan Maine, and a dinky Texas.

North also has to do with Polaris btw there is no south, and there is not official northern point. If we were in Antarctica or the arctic the compass would go crazy and we wouldn’t know where north was. Polaris would help us know where we were

Galileo, newton, taicho brahe, and many other astronomers viewed prograde as ccw and retrograde as cw. What we call north would always be "upright" because astronomers would have insisted since it is the upright orientation for a prograde orbit. Map makers aside. Given CCW is generally considered a positive direction for rotational motion and torque in engineering and science, I would argue that it may have stayed that way even if astronomers we're at the southern hemisphere.

Theres no gravity in space, directionailty is all relative.

One of the presocratics draw the first world map, and the reference por the north was the polar star, because is the only star that was the entire year was that star, so that's why he used the north as a reference, if the first would have been made in australa it would have been with reference of the south star and the south would be in top

I don't understand why the conversation went to space. Just The compass needle would suffice. North is not in relation to other places, it is decided based on the magnetic field around earth. You could draw the map anyway up, but North would always be North while magnetism of the Earth's core remains, which makes it a convenient way up.

Polaris may be used for north/south or a physicist/mathematician would the “right hand rule” when your fingers point east (rotation) your extended thumb points north.

North is in reference to the magnetic north lol

It is my understanding that North only became up once the compass was adopted. Before the compass was adopted "up" for Europeans was East. That is because Jerusalem was East of Europe. However you cut it Australia is South of North. But with the old pre-compass system maybe, since Australia is East of Jerusalem, it is "up." With this being said maybe you can think of Australia as a being a little closer to heaven than locations to the West?

To save the church ! For sure !

The reference point is sun sets in the muddy pool .

Your flipped wooden Australia looks like a corgi to me. 😂

In India maps are south-side-up. It's kinda trippy.

What does your compass point to as north downunder?

I have my doubts any of this discussion or the phonecall was "off the cuff". Matt was waayy to cocky from the outset.

North is based off the North Star (Polaris) reference which is based on the earth’s spin on its axis which is why we have the orientation of East and West. There is no south Star reference. This was discovered a long time ago in a galaxy far far away. I’m disappointed JA didn’t get that.

dont know comments but: right answer: Sun effects to the dirrections so you cant arbitorily decide shout and west in the way that sun keeps anyway rising from the east and going down to west. also magnet always showing same place. but you can place yourself in the center of the map.

Some cultures in East Asia actually use East as the top of their maps!

FUN FACT II: Argentina and chile are futher south than tasmania, we are the real end of the world mate ;)

Matt, as an Australian Christian you surely know tgat tge long arm of tge Southern Cross points down toward the South Pole - so forget geophysics, the correct answer is written in the stars!

Look at Egypt the lower Nile is north of the upper Nile.

Medieval maps used to show the east at the top.