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Science 4: Latitude and Longitude 84 Views


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Description:

Don't you give us any latitude...without providing a longitude, too. We'd be totally lost without both. Today's lesson is all about finding yourself (and other things) with latitude and longitude.

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:04

[Dino and Coop singing]

00:13

If you want to invite a buddy over to your place, you're gonna have to give them your address.

00:17

…Well, we guess you don't have to…you could just follow them around as they wander [Guy following his friend]

00:19

around your neighborhood all day trying to find you and laugh at them from the bushes.

00:23

…Though you might not stay friends if you do that… [His friend is looking angry]

00:25

So let's say that you decide to be nice and give them your address. [They shake hands]

00:28

You tell them you live on 123 Main Street, and bingo!

00:31

Your friend comes over, you chow on left over Chinese food, watch movies all night, and [Guys eating in front of the TV]

00:35

pass out exhausted at midnight.

00:36

But plot twist…what if your friend was an alien from outer space?

00:39

Well, first of all, congrats on contacting aliens! [Guy spilts in half to reveal an alien]

00:42

That's pretty rad.

00:43

But here's the thing…if you only gave them your address, 123 Main Street, they'd have

00:47

a pretty hard time finding you. [Alien searching down the street for the address]

00:48

Why?

00:49

Because there are over 10,000 streets in America named Main Street.

00:52

…huh.

00:53

Maybe we need to be a little more creative about naming things… [Alien looking confused]

00:56

Anyway, you should probably narrow things down a little, because we don't want your

00:59

cool alien friend to get angry and decide to give world domination a shot. [The aliens eyes go red]

01:04

So how do you narrow things down?

01:06

Well, you could give them your state or zip code, but your alien bud just happens

01:10

to be using a map out of the country, so your best bet would be to give them your latitude

01:14

and longitude coordinates. [Latitude and longtitude grid appears over a map]

01:17

You can think of latitude and longitude as an imaginary grid of lines that crisscrosses

01:21

the entire world.

01:22

Lines of latitude run East and West, and are used to measure North and South.

01:26

The equator right here in the middle is what divides the Earth in half. [Dino and Coop looking at the equator]

01:29

It runs through Africa, Indonesia, and Ecuador in South America.

01:33

The equator is 0 degrees latitude, and as you move away from the equator in either North

01:38

or South directions, the lines of latitude go up in value – meaning that 10 degrees [The degrees of latitude are shown]

01:43

north is closer to the equator than 30 degrees north.

01:46

Make sense so far?

01:47

Good.

01:47

Because if you understand the lines of latitude, then the lines of longitude will be a breeze. [Alien looking at a globe]

01:51

Lines of longitude run North to South, are used to measure East and West.

01:56

Just like the equator is the middle point for latitude, the prime meridian is the middle

02:00

line for these lines – it's 0 degrees longitude.

02:03

And as you move away from it in either direction, well, the numbers go up.

02:07

Easy, right?

02:08

So how might our alien friend use these lines to find a location? [Alien scratching his head]

02:11

Well, by combining both the latitude and longitude, you get coordinates which can be used to pinpoint

02:16

an exact location.

02:17

So if someone gave us the coordinates 30 degrees North, 90 degrees West, where would we be…? [Alien looking for the coordinates]

02:23

Since latitude is always listed first, we'd find that line first….riiiiight…here. [Finger going along the latitude line]

02:28

Bingo.

02:29

30 degrees north.

02:30

Then, we'd follow that line until it intersected with 90 degrees west and voila, we're looking

02:35

at gumbo and crawfish in New Orleans, Louisiana!

02:38

Every single location on Earth can be found using these types of coordinates! [The pyramids with their coordinates]

02:42

It's a sort of like a global address.

02:44

That means that if you have the coordinates for a location, you can find it quickly and

02:48

easily with the help of a GPS or a computer program like Google Maps. [Someone using a GPS]

02:52

Though…not a whole lot of people use coordinates, so if you have a human party, maybe just stick

02:56

to giving your actual address. [Guy looks angry as his friend has given him coordinates]

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