
The Secrets of the Wave Pilots - batguano
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/20/magazine/the-secrets-of-the-wave-pilots.html
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aaronharnly
This story is remarkable and deserves not to have been buried :(

"But recent studies have shown that people who use GPS, when given a pen and
paper, draw less-precise maps of the areas they travel through and remember
fewer details about the landmarks they pass; paradoxically, this seems to be
because they make fewer mistakes getting to where they’re going. Being lost —
assuming, of course, that you are eventually found — has one obvious benefit:
the chance to learn about the wider world and reframe your perspective."

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calebsurfs
If you found this interesting and want a fascinating book on the subject I
recommend We, the Navigators.

[http://www.amazon.com/We-Navigators-Ancient-Landfinding-
Paci...](http://www.amazon.com/We-Navigators-Ancient-Landfinding-
Pacific/dp/0824815823) It documents a study done of other Pacific Islanders
who use waves to navigate. Hawaii was discovered because islanders observed
swells from storms in the North Pacific being attenuated as the storm passed
'behind' the island chain.

Islanders also used a completely different form of celestial navigation that
involved following series of stars as they rose and set on the horizon. I.e.,
follow Antares while it is < 10° over the horizon, then follow Pollox, etc
until you reach Papeete.

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mchahn
When I moved to Southern California I had GPS nav in my car. Being new to the
area I used it on every trip. After a year or so I realized I still had no
idea how to get to anywhere.

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devenson
If you set your GPS to be always oriented north like a paper map despite your
own changing orientation as you drive, you will maintain a better spatial
awareness as you travel about the city. This way the GPS becomes a learning
aid instead of a crutch.

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Furincer
For clarity to others before clicking: this is NOT about Pilot Wave theory. It
is about seafaring pilots, so don't expect theoretical physics being discussed
in the comments.

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curtis
This is a fairly long article, and if you're inclined to start skimming part
way through then you should make it a point to read the last two paragraphs in
full.

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Patient0
Could someone repost the last two paragraphs here? The page somehow resets
whenever I try to scroll all the way to the bottom.

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SOLAR_FIELDS
"Until November, when van Vledder visited Cambridge, Mass., where he and Huth
sequestered themselves in Huth’s office. As they mapped the coordinates Huth
had recorded atop van Vledder’s model of sea conditions, they found that the
path they had taken was exactly perpendicular to a dominant eastern swell
flowing between Majuro and Aur. And at places where the swell, influenced by
the surrounding atolls, turned slightly northeast or southeast, the path bent
to match. It was a curve. Everyone had assumed that a wave called ‘‘backbone’’
would look like one. ‘‘But nobody said the di lep is a straight line,’’ van
Vledder said.

What if, they conjectured, the ‘‘road’’ isn’t a single wave reflecting back
and forth between every possible combination of atolls and islands; what if it
is the path you take if you keep your vessel at 90 degrees to the strongest
swell flowing between neighboring bodies of land? Position your broadside
correctly, smack in the di lep’s path, and your hull would rock symmetrically,
side to side — in a manner that would turn a loose cabbage into a pendulum and
teach an anthropologist, a physicist and an oceanographer a hard lesson about
the human gastrointestinal system’s adaptation to life at sea. In other words,
it was as Joel’s uncle had, it turned out, told them: The di lep feels like
pidodo, diarrhea. We might have been riding it all along."

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carlob
> the most puzzling detail of Genz’s translation of Joel’s description was his
> claim that the di lep connected each atoll and island to all 33 others. That
> would yield a trillion trillion paths, far too many for even the most adept
> wave pilot to memorize.

I don't follow the math if there are 34 atolls, wouldn't there be just 527
paths between them?

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zachrose
I count 561.

If you want the number of unique trips that visit each island once, thats 34!,
or 2.95e38. If you want the number of edges in a complete undirected graph,
that's (34*(34-1))/2, or 561.

Maybe when you account for currents the route from one atoll to another might
be different than the same trip in reverse. If so there could be 1122 paths.

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techer
Psychogeography

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychogeography](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychogeography)

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eouw0o83hf
Very long, but also very well written and worth the read

