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Date:         Sun, 28 Mar 2010 12:38:02 -0500
Reply-To:     mcneely4@COX.NET
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Dave Mcneely <mcneely4@COX.NET>
Subject:      Re: GPS Recommendation
Comments: To: Marc Sayer <marcsayer@HUGHES.NET>
In-Reply-To:  <4BAF8928.4080005@hughes.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8

I thought the point of a map was to get somewhere, while understanding where that somewhere is. With a map I have the option of exploring when and if I have time. The GPS is a great way to get somewhere sometimes (the times it works), but not to understand the terrain. More than one person has been sent up a blind alley that he would have known about and probably not pursued if he'd consulted a map. That's all I'm sayin'.

BTW, I have to use GPS for some of my work. I once encountered a young colleague who told me that the location on a creek that I'd reported for a fish collection was not where I said it was. Turned out he had used a GPS to look it up (not to field truth it), and his lat/long did not agree with mine. I'd been there, he hadn't, but he insisted that because his GPS gave him (erroneous) data, (reporting a bridge to be on a different road from the one it was on), he insisted it was the right location, down to a thousandth of a second. He claimed there was no bridge located at the lat/long I reported. People can become tech dependent, rather than common sense dependent. He and I both had reason to return to the location together for some further work. I suggested he meet me there. I went, started on the part of the work I could do myself, but he never showed up. I called him. He was wandering around, trying to get to where his erroneous GPS told him to go. He was in the vicinity, but about three miles away on a road that didn't even get to the creek. I directed him how to get to me, and we got the work done, hours late.

Maps can be erroneous, too, of course.

People can be tech dependent, at the expense of common sense.

DMc

---- Marc Sayer <marcsayer@HUGHES.NET> wrote: > Gee and here I thought the point of a GPS was to get where you need to > go without spending a lot of time exploring. :-D I use a GPS to get > somewhere. I don't need maps or GPS to pull a Lewis & Clark, just some > free time a tank of gas, and my emergency kit (food, water, warm > clothes, you know, the stuff you need when you get lost in the wilds for > a few days). OTOH, it's been so long since I've had time to do any > "splorin" that I don't even know where that emergency kit is anymore. > > > Even if I decided I wanted a GPS for travel, I would still use maps, which are much more fun. I've never seen a GPS that caused me to wonder about the source of the toponyms I encountered, or caused me to peruse sections of terrain just for the hell of it, and eventually to travel over them though I hadn't planned to. Using a GPS, I would never have known of the existence of Dirty Woman Creek, Drunkard's Branch, the twin towns of Frog and Frognot, or Bug Tussle, Texas and Bug Tussle, Oklahoma. > > > > Surely you GPS users also have and use maps. Otherwise, what is life for? > > > > -- > > Marc Sayer > Journalist, Photographer, Dog Trainer (APDT member #062956) > Board member - Western States Great Dane Rescue Association > Director of Operations & Training - Deaf Dane Rescue Inc. > Oakridge, OR USA > > My Homepage - http://gracieland.org > Deaf Dane Rescue - http://deafdane.org > Western States Great Dane Rescue Association - http://wsgdra.org > RescueWatchdogs - http://rescuewatchdogs.org > Association of Pet Dog Trainers - http://APDT.com

-- David McNeely


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