Section 11

Navigation Instruments: The Tools of Exploration

Section Overview

• The section intertwines two types of navigation:
      - Physical Navigation: How humans and animals navigate across Earth.
      - Political Navigation: How humans are granted or denied passage across borders.

• Both stories focus on thresholds such as coastlines, borders, and harbors.

• Key questions:
      - What does it mean to navigate?
      - Who is allowed to navigate?
      - What responsibilities do we have toward those turned away?

Instruments of Exploration

• European explorers in the 15th century used navigation tools that transformed the ocean:
      - Instruments were derived primarily from Chinese and Islamic inventions.
      - European explorers inherited and systematized these technologies.

Key Navigation Instruments

Impact of the Compass

• The compass profoundly impacted navigation and global exploration.

• Its limitations include:
      - Points to magnetic north, not geographic north (magnetic declination).
      - Could only determine direction, not specific location (latitude required stars/astrolabe).

Longitude Problem

• Latitude: Measured using celestial bodies (sun or Pole Star).

• Longitude: Required accurate timekeeping for local time comparison with Greenwich Mean Time.

• Pre-chronometers: Sailors used dead reckoning to estimate their position based on the last known location, speed, and direction.

• The challenge of accurate longitude determination led to historical government-funded science prizes.

Animal Navigation: Magnetoreception, Stars, and the Instinct to Find

• The remarkable navigation skills of animals involve sensory and cognitive mechanisms:
      - Monarch butterflies find their way from Canada to Mexico.
      - Sea turtles return to their hatching beaches decades later.
      - Desert ants navigate across featureless terrain to their nests.

Mechanisms of Animal Navigation

Indigo Bunting Study

• Indigo buntings navigate using the stars.

• Young buntings reared in a planetarium aligned to an artificial pole successfully oriented towards the celestial axis.

Dung Beetles and the Milky Way

• Dung beetles have been found to navigate using the Milky Way, moving in straight lines to escape competition.

Indigenous Navigation: The Map in the Mind

• Polynesian voyaging and wayfinding represent sophisticated spatial knowledge using stars, ocean swells, and other natural signs.

Polynesian Wayfinding Techniques

• Star Compass: A mental navigation tool dividing the horizon into 32 sections based on celestial bodies.

• Ocean Swells: Navigators can feel swell directions through their bodies.

• Stars: Rising and setting stars provide directional cues; memorizing which stars pass overhead offers latitude information.

• Sun and Wind: Tracks help navigators maintain positions; consistent seasonal patterns are read as positional references.

• Birds and Ocean Color: Bird flight patterns suggest proximity to land; changes in ocean color indicate shallow waters.

• Cloud Formations: Patterns observed over land are signs of nearby islands.

Inuit Navigation

• Inuit wayfinders have developed sophisticated navigation techniques in the Arctic, using natural cues from the environment.
      - Signs of Direction: Characteristic patterns in snowdrifts (sastrugi) indicate direction.
      - Celestial Orientation: Specific constellations help with navigation.

The Fog of Maps: Knowledge, Discovery, and the Unknown

• Historical mapping often reflected unknown and exploratory space.
      - Physical and epistemic exploration of uncharted territories parallels the experience in video games.
      - Examples include exploring maps with fog of war mechanics that represent blank spaces in European cartography.

Cognitive Fog and Digital Navigation

• The Google Effect: Digital amnesia as more people rely on GPS for navigation, leading to weaker spatial memory compared to traditional navigators.

• The impact of using smartphones and the difference in brain activity between experienced navigators and occasional users.

Airport Limbo: The Terminal and the Stateless

• Examines narratives around stateless individuals, such as represented in the film The Terminal by Spielberg.
      - Based on Mehran Karimi Nasseri's real-life experiences of statelessness in an airport setting.

Case Studies of Statelessness

The MS St. Louis and the Politics of Refuge

• In 1939, MS St. Louis embarked with 937 Jewish refugees; denied entry into Cuba, the U.S., and Canada.

• The ship returned to Europe, leading to the majority of passengers being lost to the Holocaust.

Context of Refugee Denial in 1939

• Immigration Quotas: Restricted German quotas limited entry; passengers didn't hold approved visas.

• Antisemitism: Widespread anti-Jewish sentiment influenced decisions across countries.

• Political Corruption: Issues within Cuba’s government affected the landing certificates.

• Cultural Ramifications: Historical parallels drawn to contemporary refugee debates echo earlier sentiments and restrictions.

Immigrant Poetry: Voice at the Threshold

• Poetry reflecting various immigrant experiences highlights different perspectives and identities resulting from the act of crossing borders.

Poems Explored

The Art of Migration: Liminality and Belonging

• Artistic interpretations regarding migration explore experiences of being in-between identities and homes.

Artists and Interpretative Works

Synthesis: The Right to Arrive

• The act of crossing is explored through various lenses:
      - Tools of exploration enable crossings but also create catastrophic conditions.
      - Animal navigation reveals migration’s ancient roots.
      - Indigenous wayfinding highlights cultural knowledge of navigation.
      - Mapping discusses the fog of unknown regions and the impact on navigation knowledge.
      - Moral Query: Who controls borders? Decisions about thresholds reflect power dynamics and moral responsibility.

Key Terms & Definitions

• Magnetic Declination: Angular difference between magnetic north and geographic north.

• Dead Reckoning: Position estimation using previously known data adjusted for trajectory.

• Longitude Problem: Historical challenge determining east-west locations at sea.

• Magnetoreception: The ability to detect Earth's magnetic field for navigation.

• Cryptochromes: Proteins in birds possibly enabling the 'visual' perception of magnetic fields.

• Zugunruhe: Seasonal migratory restlessness linked to birds' internal biological clocks.

• Wayfinding: Non-instrument navigation, particularly by the Polynesians.

• Hōkūleʻa: Traditional Hawaiian canoe characterized by cultural navigation practices.

• Fog of War: Gamified mechanic representing unexplored areas.

• Non-refoulement: Refugee law principle prohibiting return to danger.

• Statelessness: Condition of lacking national recognition and protections.

• Path Integration: Navigation through continuous step-counting relative to the starting point.

Referenced Sources

1. Compass — National Geographic Education

2. How Do Birds Navigate? — Smithsonian Science Education Center

3. Dung Beetles Navigate Using the Milky Way — Science (2013)

4. Polynesian Wayfinding — Polynesian Voyaging Society / Hōkūleʻa (hokulea.com)

5. Voyage of the St. Louis — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia

6. MS St. Louis — Wikipedia

7. MS St. Louis — Britannica

8. A Ship of Jewish Refugees Was Refused US Landing in 1939 — History.com

9. Canada and MS St. Louis — Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21

10. Arctic Wayfinders — terrain.org

11. Did Vikings Navigate by Sunstone? — Scientific American

12. Edward Snowden airport limbo ends — Reuters (2013)

13. How People End Up Living at Airports — Sydney Morning Herald (2022)