Dark matter island in the Pacific?

AI Thread Summary
The discussion revolves around the concept of a "dark matter island" in the Pacific, referencing a BBC article. Participants express skepticism about the existence of this island, noting that it has been previously disproven. The conversation shifts to the reliability of Google Maps, with users sharing personal experiences of inaccuracies in mapping services, including misdirected GPS routes and uncorrected errors. There are humorous exchanges about how these mapping errors can lead to absurd situations, such as being unable to receive deliveries. The dialogue touches on the possibility that the island's appearance on maps could be due to human error or outdated cartographic data, with some suggesting that Google might have manipulated images to fill gaps. Overall, the thread highlights concerns about the accuracy of digital mapping technologies and the implications of relying on them for navigation and geographic information.
Studiot
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Wasn't there a plane crash near there?
 


The same island was proven not to exist previously. I don't know why the current crop of people think they are the first people to realize this.
 


It's like Momoto's nose.
 


Further study of the area may well help to solve the problem of Atlantis and Brigadoon.
 


Did google actually photoshop that in?

Google maps are full of errors. They have my street wrong. I keep trying to use their "service" were you can send them corrections to map mistakes, but the service is broken.
 


Evo -

I am sorry to inform you that your street does not in fact exist. It does seem odd that you are able to go home everyday...

Sometimes we deal with correcting GIS information for our physical plant: meters, customer sets, etc., (gas company). About 5000 meters and associated stuff took an unplanned trip to the middle of the Indian Ocean. Dredging those suckers up from the abyssal plain was a miserable task. And expensive, too. :)

Actually, a tech managed to invert signs on lat and long values for these plant items. It got propagated to our maps. So Scotty beamed all the items down to the ocean depths. All of the altitude values were way off, as well. People running those maps off on plotters had a cow...

...there was zero topographic information. No cities or streets either.

Rather like Evo's street I think. Evo, check your GPS to make sure you, too, are not really at home under the sea.
 


jim mcnamara said:
Evo -

I am sorry to inform you that your street does not in fact exist. It does seem odd that you are able to go home everyday...
LOL! That would be funny except I can't get pizza delivery without the call from the store manager about their driver reporting a prank order. :frown:

The google map shows to enter from the neighboring subdivision, go down, turn left and arrive at my house. Great, except the road doesn't go through, it ends in a hill, and there's a fence. The street doesn't go through. I've been trying for 5 years to get google to correct it. Perhaps if they fixed their map error reporting they could get corrections.

I even tell them about the map error. It never gets to the driver. I've had deliveries take an hour and a half when the kid returns to the store, takes off with another order and my food sits there until I call and try to get it re-sent.

AAARRRGH!
 
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jim mcnamara said:
Sometimes we deal with correcting GIS information for our physical plant: meters, customer sets, etc., (gas company). About 5000 meters and associated stuff took an unplanned trip to the middle of the Indian Ocean. Dredging those suckers up from the abyssal plain was a miserable task. And expensive, too. :)

Actually, a tech managed to invert signs on lat and long values for these plant items. It got propagated to our maps. So Scotty beamed all the items down to the ocean depths. All of the altitude values were way off, as well. People running those maps off on plotters had a cow...

...there was zero topographic information. No cities or streets either.

Rather like Evo's street I think. Evo, check your GPS to make sure you, too, are not really at home under the sea.
Lol, that's pretty bad!
 
  • #10


It's the Island from the the TV show "Lost". Just ignore it, it'll go away.
 
  • #11


Maybe it's Gilligan's Island!
 
  • #12


I used to have the same problem Evo has. I live in the backwoods, and if I plug my normal address into GPS it takes me to dead end. So one day I started to experiment and turns out if I type 666 into my address it led me to my front gate. So I jokingly refer to my entrance as the Gates to Hell now.
 
  • #13


jtbell said:
Maybe it's Gilligan's Island!

Nah, Gilligan's Island is a cute little thing in a bay on Oahu.
 
  • #14


How is this possible? I thought we took satellite photos of the Earth?
 
  • #15


tahayassen said:
How is this possible? I thought we took satellite photos of the Earth?
Yes, and then someone says, ok, these older maps show an island, and I don't see it, so let's photoshop one in. The same way google maps shows that people can drive straight through a small cliff on a road that doesn't exist as the only way to reach me.
 
  • #16


Evo said:
Yes, and then someone says, ok, these older maps show an island, and I don't see it, so let's photoshop one in. The same way google maps shows that people can drive straight through a small cliff on a road that doesn't exist as the only way to reach me.

I'm curious to how they came to the conclusion to photo-shopping images of Earth to satisfy a map that is supposed to model the earth. I guess it just didn't come to their mind that there is no island and they thought the photos weren't high resolution or something?
 
  • #17


tahayassen said:
I'm curious to how they came to the conclusion to photo-shopping images of Earth to satisfy a map that is supposed to model the earth. I guess it just didn't come to their mind that there is no island and they thought the photos weren't high resolution or something?
According to the article in the OP.

How did it find its way onto the maps? We just don't know, but we plan to follow up and find out."

Australia's Hydrographic Service, which produces the country's nautical charts, says its appearance on some scientific maps and Google Earth could just be the result of human error, repeated down the years.

A spokesman for Google said they consult a variety of authoritative sources when making their maps.
 
  • #18


Evo said:
According to the article in the OP.

Oh so Google makes their maps? I thought Google Earth was based on actual images.
 
  • #19


tahayassen said:
Oh so Google makes their maps? I thought Google Earth was based on actual images.
That doesn't mean they can't tweak them.
 
  • #20


Studiot said:
Could this island be really there but made of dark matter?
The Earth is made of dark matter. All except for this island that is.
 
  • #21


tahayassen said:
Oh so Google makes their maps? I thought Google Earth was based on actual images.

Perhaps it was cloudy the day they took the picture.
 
  • #22


Note: Google Earth includes clouds in some of the images. Sometimes they obscure quite large ground features.
OTOH: over open water they don't seem to be using any specific images.
Maybe they trusted a bunch of cartographers who claimed to have been there and stood on the island over a photographing technology that has been known to glitch?

Of course - scientifically - a mismatch like that would be grounds for further investigation rather than fudging the results but it happens more than you'd suspect.

I recall NZ science students (at HS level) being penalized in external exams if they did not draw their "best-fit" lines through the origin when the theory predicted that's where they should end up (but the data said otherwise). Doesn't happen now but some schools still teach that kind of fudge.
 
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  • #23


Out of curiosity - just went there in google earth.
The black area shown in the BBC article pics is not there but there are a bunch of photos claiming to be of the sights there ... the wildlife example is particularly striking.
 
  • #24


I wonder if perhaps Google employed Jonathan Swift as a cartographic consultant?
 

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