WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.980 I want you to picture pulling out your phone 00:00:01.980 --> 00:00:04.910 right now. opening up your preferred map app 00:00:04.910 --> 00:00:07.230 and typing in a destination you don't even think 00:00:07.230 --> 00:00:10.349 about it exactly you trust that digital interface 00:00:10.349 --> 00:00:13.609 implicitly you trust the coastlines the highways 00:00:13.609 --> 00:00:16.870 the the continental shelves but i want you to 00:00:16.870 --> 00:00:19.190 consider the reality of navigating the world 00:00:19.190 --> 00:00:22.570 before satellite imagery oh it was wild we are 00:00:22.570 --> 00:00:24.809 looking at a stretch of history where the map 00:00:24.809 --> 00:00:27.350 of the world was basically just a living document 00:00:27.350 --> 00:00:30.289 it was compiled from maritime rumors calculated 00:00:30.289 --> 00:00:34.850 guesses and literally at The degree of faith 00:00:34.850 --> 00:00:38.390 that people placed in those early maps is it's 00:00:38.390 --> 00:00:40.090 actually staggering when you really look at the 00:00:40.090 --> 00:00:42.229 methodology behind them. Yeah. Society built 00:00:42.229 --> 00:00:44.950 global trade routes and drew up geopolitical 00:00:44.950 --> 00:00:47.630 boundaries based on coordinates that were, in 00:00:47.630 --> 00:00:49.950 many cases, just entirely fictitious. And that 00:00:49.950 --> 00:00:52.310 brings us to the core of our deep dive today. 00:00:53.000 --> 00:00:55.840 Our source material is a comprehensive Wikipedia 00:00:55.840 --> 00:00:58.479 article on the phenomenon of phantom islands. 00:00:58.799 --> 00:01:01.039 Which is such a fascinating topic. It really 00:01:01.039 --> 00:01:04.599 is. Our mission today is to explore these geographical 00:01:04.599 --> 00:01:07.000 features that were confidently drawn on world 00:01:07.000 --> 00:01:10.859 maps, recorded in ship logs, and even put into 00:01:10.859 --> 00:01:12.780 international treaties. Sometimes for centuries. 00:01:13.159 --> 00:01:15.980 Right. Only to be completely undiscovered later. 00:01:16.829 --> 00:01:18.750 To frame this discussion accurately, though, 00:01:18.810 --> 00:01:21.310 we really need to distinguish what a phantom 00:01:21.310 --> 00:01:24.049 island actually is. Because it's not Atlantis. 00:01:24.510 --> 00:01:27.989 Exactly. It's not a lost land. A lost land falls 00:01:27.989 --> 00:01:31.069 into the realm of, you know, mythology. Yeah. 00:01:31.129 --> 00:01:33.969 Places that supposedly existed but were destroyed 00:01:33.969 --> 00:01:37.390 by some cataclysm or swallowed by the sea. Right. 00:01:37.450 --> 00:01:40.049 Like an ancient civilization wiped out. Right. 00:01:40.450 --> 00:01:43.409 But a phantom island is an epistemological error. 00:01:44.540 --> 00:01:46.760 It is a place that contemporary sailors and mapmakers 00:01:46.760 --> 00:01:49.180 insisted was actively there in their present 00:01:49.180 --> 00:01:51.980 time. They swore they saw it. They did. But later 00:01:51.980 --> 00:01:53.900 generations realized it was never there in the 00:01:53.900 --> 00:01:56.400 first place, or at least they fundamentally misunderstood 00:01:56.400 --> 00:01:58.719 what they were looking at. Okay, let's unpack 00:01:58.719 --> 00:02:01.180 this because the historical record is just saturated 00:02:01.180 --> 00:02:03.519 with these navigational blunders. Oh, completely. 00:02:03.659 --> 00:02:05.859 We're looking at this cascading effect where 00:02:05.859 --> 00:02:10.259 a simple human error turns into a permanent physical 00:02:10.259 --> 00:02:14.099 reality on a global scale. The island of California 00:02:14.099 --> 00:02:16.139 is probably the prime example of this. I love 00:02:16.139 --> 00:02:18.680 this one. The documentation shows that starting 00:02:18.680 --> 00:02:22.960 around 1510, the Baja California Peninsula was 00:02:22.960 --> 00:02:25.919 actually drawn as a massive detached island. 00:02:26.159 --> 00:02:28.460 Right. Not connected to North America at all. 00:02:28.639 --> 00:02:31.280 Right. Early explorers navigating the western 00:02:31.280 --> 00:02:33.860 coast hit the Gulf of California and just assumed 00:02:33.860 --> 00:02:36.919 that body of water was a continuous strait. They 00:02:36.919 --> 00:02:39.219 essentially extrapolated a massive geographical 00:02:39.219 --> 00:02:42.020 feature from very limited data. And what's crazy 00:02:42.020 --> 00:02:44.680 is how long that specific error dominated the 00:02:44.680 --> 00:02:47.580 maps, even after later expeditions proved it 00:02:47.580 --> 00:02:50.159 was a peninsula. That persistence really speaks 00:02:50.159 --> 00:02:52.560 to the institutional authority of cartography 00:02:52.560 --> 00:02:54.520 at the time. You have to remember maps were incredibly 00:02:54.520 --> 00:02:57.120 expensive. Yes, state -sponsored assets. Exactly. 00:02:57.180 --> 00:03:00.259 If a prominent Dutch or Spanish mapmaker engraved 00:03:00.259 --> 00:03:02.300 a coastline a certain way, that representation 00:03:02.300 --> 00:03:05.800 became reality. It was canon. Yes. It was actually 00:03:05.800 --> 00:03:09.120 safer for a later mapmaker to just copy an established 00:03:09.120 --> 00:03:11.800 error than to risk publishing some radical new 00:03:11.800 --> 00:03:14.960 layout based on one ship's unverified log. Which 00:03:14.960 --> 00:03:17.960 leads to some incredible mistakes. Like the island 00:03:17.960 --> 00:03:20.300 of California was a misinterpretation of real 00:03:20.300 --> 00:03:23.099 land, but other phantom islands were just severe 00:03:23.099 --> 00:03:25.740 mathematical failure. The Alas de Mesa is a perfect 00:03:25.740 --> 00:03:28.460 case study in that. Yes. The 1100 mile typo. 00:03:28.500 --> 00:03:31.819 It really was. So in 1555, the Spanish navigator 00:03:31.819 --> 00:03:34.300 Juan Gaitano charts this arc. Archipelago in 00:03:34.300 --> 00:03:36.759 the Central Pacific. He names them La Mesa and 00:03:36.759 --> 00:03:39.780 Las Monjes. Right. But the fundamental issue 00:03:39.780 --> 00:03:42.900 here was the tech of the era. He was operating 00:03:42.900 --> 00:03:45.419 without a marine chronometer. Which is crucial 00:03:45.419 --> 00:03:47.979 for finding longitude. Exactly. So he's relying 00:03:47.979 --> 00:03:50.819 entirely on dead reckoning to estimate his east 00:03:50.819 --> 00:03:53.699 -west position over thousands of miles of open 00:03:53.699 --> 00:03:56.419 ocean. And dead reckoning in the Pacific, it 00:03:56.419 --> 00:03:59.120 basically required Gaetano to calculate his longitude 00:03:59.120 --> 00:04:01.680 by guessing his ship's speed. Just guessing. 00:04:01.840 --> 00:04:03.740 Pretty much. Factoring in ocean currents, wind 00:04:03.740 --> 00:04:06.159 variance, the time elapse, the margin of error 00:04:06.159 --> 00:04:09.379 on a trans -Pacific voyage. And the data shows 00:04:09.379 --> 00:04:12.180 he charted these islands 17 degrees west of their 00:04:12.180 --> 00:04:14.740 actual location. Which translates to an error 00:04:14.740 --> 00:04:19.180 of roughly 1 ,100 miles. 1 ,100 miles. But this 00:04:19.180 --> 00:04:21.079 raises a really critical question for you to 00:04:21.079 --> 00:04:23.920 think about. If he charted these islands that 00:04:23.920 --> 00:04:27.269 far from their true location, Why did Spanish 00:04:27.269 --> 00:04:31.129 charts keep this phantom archipelago in the middle 00:04:31.129 --> 00:04:33.769 of empty ocean for over 200 years? Because the 00:04:33.769 --> 00:04:36.910 Pacific is just incomprehensibly vast. Yeah. 00:04:37.009 --> 00:04:39.589 And the Spanish galleon trade routes were highly 00:04:39.589 --> 00:04:42.470 compartmentalized. Ships sailing between Manila 00:04:42.470 --> 00:04:45.949 and Acapulco followed these very specific latitudinal 00:04:45.949 --> 00:04:48.170 tracks to catch the trade winds. So they just 00:04:48.170 --> 00:04:50.350 never went near the fake islands. Right. They 00:04:50.350 --> 00:04:53.350 rarely deviated into those empty zones. It wasn't 00:04:53.350 --> 00:04:56.250 until James Cook surveyed the region in... that 00:04:56.250 --> 00:04:58.189 the cartographic community realized the Alas 00:04:58.189 --> 00:05:00.529 de Mesa were actually the Hawaiian islands. So 00:05:00.529 --> 00:05:02.930 Gaetano had actually discovered Hawaii. He had, 00:05:03.170 --> 00:05:06.529 but his math was so bad that he basically duplicated 00:05:06.529 --> 00:05:09.189 the entire archipelago 1 ,100 miles away on paper. 00:05:09.410 --> 00:05:13.350 That is wild. But you know, his error was out 00:05:13.350 --> 00:05:16.399 in the open ocean. When these errors happen near 00:05:16.399 --> 00:05:19.519 coastlines or inland waterways, they stop being 00:05:19.519 --> 00:05:21.779 just navigational hazards. They start causing 00:05:21.779 --> 00:05:24.939 geopolitical crises. Exactly. Isle Philippot 00:05:24.939 --> 00:05:27.920 is a phantom island that became heavily entangled 00:05:27.920 --> 00:05:30.500 in international statecraft. According to early 00:05:30.500 --> 00:05:33.480 maps, this was a very substantial landmass right 00:05:33.480 --> 00:05:35.800 in the middle of Lake Superior. A landmass that 00:05:35.800 --> 00:05:38.439 we now know, thanks to satellites, is completely 00:05:38.439 --> 00:05:40.959 absent. It doesn't exist. The consensus seems 00:05:40.959 --> 00:05:44.000 to be that early explorers saw the very real 00:05:44.139 --> 00:05:47.060 Isle Royale from different angles and just documented 00:05:47.060 --> 00:05:49.540 it as two distinct islands. Which is a fairly 00:05:49.540 --> 00:05:52.319 common mistake. Right. But Isle Philippot didn't 00:05:52.319 --> 00:05:54.939 just sit in some dusty archive. During the negotiations 00:05:54.939 --> 00:05:58.339 for the 1783 Treaty of Paris. The treaty that 00:05:58.339 --> 00:06:00.459 ended the American Revolutionary War. Exactly. 00:06:00.740 --> 00:06:03.220 You have diplomats like Benjamin Franklin and 00:06:03.220 --> 00:06:05.579 Richard Oswald relying on the John Mitchell map 00:06:05.579 --> 00:06:08.379 of 1755 to establish the borders of the United 00:06:08.379 --> 00:06:11.240 States. And they explicitly used Isle Philippot 00:06:11.240 --> 00:06:14.610 as a fixed geographical landmark. They used it 00:06:14.610 --> 00:06:16.829 to draw the boundary line dividing the U .S. 00:06:16.829 --> 00:06:19.370 from the future territory of Canada. What's fascinating 00:06:19.370 --> 00:06:22.269 here is the absolute fragility of historical 00:06:22.269 --> 00:06:25.709 statecraft. Yeah. You have the architects of 00:06:25.709 --> 00:06:28.629 a modern nation state negotiating the sovereign 00:06:28.629 --> 00:06:31.810 boundaries of a continent based on a cartographic 00:06:31.810 --> 00:06:35.350 ghost. It's incredible. It really exposes how 00:06:35.350 --> 00:06:39.410 heavily historical policy relied on unquestioned, 00:06:39.410 --> 00:06:42.470 unverified data. They were legally dividing land 00:06:42.470 --> 00:06:46.089 based on a mapmaker who had probably just duplicated 00:06:46.089 --> 00:06:48.189 an island out of sheer confusion. And it took 00:06:48.189 --> 00:06:50.490 decades before surveyors actually out on the 00:06:50.490 --> 00:06:52.350 ground in Lake Superior realized they were supposed 00:06:52.350 --> 00:06:54.569 to draw a border through an island that wasn't 00:06:54.569 --> 00:06:56.529 there. They must have been so confused. Completely. 00:06:57.290 --> 00:06:59.769 But when you analyze the psychological and environmental 00:06:59.769 --> 00:07:01.750 factors of all this exploration, you realize 00:07:01.750 --> 00:07:04.290 that it wasn't just poor math or confusion creating 00:07:04.290 --> 00:07:06.870 these phantom landmarks. No, extreme environments 00:07:06.870 --> 00:07:09.769 actively wage war on human perception. Especially 00:07:09.769 --> 00:07:12.410 in the polar regions. Atmospheric optics and 00:07:12.410 --> 00:07:14.649 shifting ice create physical manifestations of 00:07:14.649 --> 00:07:17.589 land that are entirely illusions. The Antarctic 00:07:17.589 --> 00:07:19.810 and Arctic circles are hostile to human cognition. 00:07:20.110 --> 00:07:22.990 You have freezing temperatures, exhaustion, sensory 00:07:22.990 --> 00:07:25.750 deprivation. Your brain just struggles to process 00:07:25.750 --> 00:07:29.019 visual... data. Exactly. A really prominent example 00:07:29.019 --> 00:07:31.980 from the sources is Benjamin Morrell's expedition 00:07:31.980 --> 00:07:35.480 in 1823. Navigating the Weddell Sea near Antarctica. 00:07:35.839 --> 00:07:39.079 Right. He recorded sighting this sprawling mountainous 00:07:39.079 --> 00:07:41.779 coastline that he called New South Greenland. 00:07:41.980 --> 00:07:44.540 But when modern scientists cross -referenced 00:07:44.540 --> 00:07:47.240 his ship logs with actual satellite topography, 00:07:47.439 --> 00:07:50.759 his position was over 500 kilometers east and 00:07:50.759 --> 00:07:53.980 97 kilometers north of the actual Antarctic Peninsula. 00:07:54.220 --> 00:07:56.850 He wasn't anywhere near land. So we have to evaluate 00:07:56.850 --> 00:07:59.329 what Morel was actually looking at when he drew 00:07:59.329 --> 00:08:01.649 that coastline. The scientific consensus points 00:08:01.649 --> 00:08:04.529 to a severe atmospheric phenomenon called a superior 00:08:04.529 --> 00:08:07.629 mirage. Explain how that works. So in polar regions, 00:08:07.790 --> 00:08:09.790 extreme temperature inversions happen when a 00:08:09.790 --> 00:08:12.250 layer of cold air sits just below a layer of 00:08:12.250 --> 00:08:14.709 warmer air. This inversion actually bends light 00:08:14.709 --> 00:08:17.930 rays downward. Like a giant lens. Exactly. Almost 00:08:17.930 --> 00:08:20.910 like a massive atmospheric lens in the sky. It 00:08:20.910 --> 00:08:22.649 takes features that are well below the horizon. 00:08:23.100 --> 00:08:25.879 like a distant ice shell for pack ice, and projects 00:08:25.879 --> 00:08:28.740 them high up. So to a ship miles away, it looks 00:08:28.740 --> 00:08:31.480 like a towering landmass. Right. Moreau was literally 00:08:31.480 --> 00:08:34.139 charting a refraction of light. And his experience 00:08:34.139 --> 00:08:36.679 is backed up by other polar expeditions. You 00:08:36.679 --> 00:08:39.039 have... Reports of Doherty Island, which stayed 00:08:39.039 --> 00:08:42.059 on Admiralty charts for decades. Or Fata Morgana 00:08:42.059 --> 00:08:45.179 land in the Arctic. Yes. Explored by J .P. Koch 00:08:45.179 --> 00:08:48.700 and H. Bertelsen as late as 1907, they mapped 00:08:48.700 --> 00:08:51.700 a coastline that literally dissolved as they 00:08:51.700 --> 00:08:53.539 got closer to it. It's terrifying when you think 00:08:53.539 --> 00:08:55.539 about it. But optical illusions only account 00:08:55.539 --> 00:08:58.019 for some of these sightings. Deep -seated cultural 00:08:58.019 --> 00:09:01.019 folklore and even theological anxiety dictated 00:09:01.019 --> 00:09:03.220 the geography of the ocean, too. Because the 00:09:03.220 --> 00:09:06.159 early maritime environment was just deeply intertwined 00:09:06.159 --> 00:09:09.059 with super... The unexplored ocean was this void 00:09:09.059 --> 00:09:11.929 where you could physically locate a myth? The 00:09:11.929 --> 00:09:14.090 mapping of High Brazil illustrates this perfectly. 00:09:14.289 --> 00:09:16.389 Oh, this is a great one. It appeared on charts 00:09:16.389 --> 00:09:19.870 as early as 1325, placed in the Atlantic Ocean 00:09:19.870 --> 00:09:23.269 due west of Ireland. And the cartography was 00:09:23.269 --> 00:09:25.750 directly informed by Celtic mythology. Right. 00:09:25.830 --> 00:09:28.289 The folklore dictated that the island was covered 00:09:28.289 --> 00:09:31.190 in this dense, magical mist. And it only became 00:09:31.190 --> 00:09:33.970 visible to the human eye for one day every seven 00:09:33.970 --> 00:09:36.350 years. Which is such a brilliant loophole. It 00:09:36.350 --> 00:09:38.750 really is. The seven -year invisibility clause 00:09:38.750 --> 00:09:42.629 is a remarkably elegant... mechanism for preserving 00:09:42.629 --> 00:09:45.950 a myth. It gives you built -in immunity against 00:09:45.950 --> 00:09:49.970 verification. Right. Because if a navigator sails 00:09:49.970 --> 00:09:52.809 to the exact coordinates and finds open water... 00:09:52.809 --> 00:09:54.809 A mapmaker's credibility is perfectly fine. They 00:09:54.809 --> 00:09:56.870 just say, oh, you missed the seven -year window. 00:09:56.990 --> 00:09:59.179 Exactly. You arrived on the wrong day. You see 00:09:59.179 --> 00:10:01.679 a similar intersection of theology and cartography 00:10:01.679 --> 00:10:04.559 over near North America with the Isle of Demons. 00:10:04.600 --> 00:10:07.220 First appearing around 1508 near Newfoundland. 00:10:07.299 --> 00:10:10.480 But its lineage actually traces back to a 1424 00:10:10.480 --> 00:10:12.639 map where it was labeled Satan houses. Right. 00:10:13.039 --> 00:10:15.080 According to the narrative at the time, this 00:10:15.080 --> 00:10:17.860 landmass was populated entirely by malevolent 00:10:17.860 --> 00:10:20.340 spirits that would torment passing ships. So 00:10:20.340 --> 00:10:23.220 the mapmakers literally treated theological dread 00:10:23.220 --> 00:10:26.480 as a physical navigable hazard. They had to chart 00:10:26.480 --> 00:10:29.940 the demons. And what's funny is to avoid the 00:10:29.940 --> 00:10:32.899 blasphemy of printing words associated with the 00:10:32.899 --> 00:10:35.759 devil on state documents, later cartographers 00:10:35.759 --> 00:10:39.279 sanitized the map. They relabeled it. salvaga 00:10:39.279 --> 00:10:42.419 yes they altered the name to adhere to religious 00:10:42.419 --> 00:10:44.639 sensibilities without ever questioning if an 00:10:44.639 --> 00:10:47.299 island full of demons actually existed they just 00:10:47.299 --> 00:10:50.559 rebranded the demon island exactly but here's 00:10:50.559 --> 00:10:53.440 where it gets really interesting okay the data 00:10:53.440 --> 00:10:55.860 reveals that some of these phantom islands were 00:10:55.860 --> 00:10:58.399 not optical illusions and they weren't myths 00:10:58.399 --> 00:11:01.399 the geological evidence suggests some of them 00:11:01.399 --> 00:11:04.320 were physically present surveyed and mapped But 00:11:04.320 --> 00:11:06.559 they had temporary geology. Right. We really 00:11:06.559 --> 00:11:08.539 have to account for the dynamic nature of the 00:11:08.539 --> 00:11:11.659 Earth's crust here. The map is static, but the 00:11:11.659 --> 00:11:14.240 geology of the ocean is absolutely not. The most 00:11:14.240 --> 00:11:16.500 compelling modern evidence for this is Sandy 00:11:16.500 --> 00:11:19.639 Island. Out in the Coral Sea. Yes, between Australia 00:11:19.639 --> 00:11:22.019 and New Caledonia. It was officially discovered 00:11:22.019 --> 00:11:24.299 and put on British charts in the late 19th century. 00:11:24.519 --> 00:11:26.379 What separates Sandy Island from something like 00:11:26.379 --> 00:11:29.259 High Brazil is its longevity. It survived into 00:11:29.259 --> 00:11:32.279 the modern era. Sandy Island was integrated into 00:11:32.279 --> 00:11:35.440 modern digitized geographic information systems. 00:11:35.720 --> 00:11:38.919 It was on Google Earth. Yes. It appeared as a 00:11:38.919 --> 00:11:42.419 distinct dark polygon on Google Earth and the 00:11:42.419 --> 00:11:45.720 World Vector Shoreline Database. It was an accepted 00:11:45.720 --> 00:11:49.720 geographical fact until 2012. Which is just mind 00:11:49.720 --> 00:11:52.179 blowing. The fact that a phantom island survived 00:11:52.179 --> 00:11:56.240 the transition from parchment maps to satellite 00:11:56.240 --> 00:11:58.379 calibrated digital data sets. It really shows 00:11:58.379 --> 00:12:00.529 the vulnerability of modern data. data aggregation. 00:12:00.669 --> 00:12:03.590 It really does. So in 2012, this Australian research 00:12:03.590 --> 00:12:06.590 vessel, the RV Southern Surveyor, is conducting 00:12:06.590 --> 00:12:09.289 mapping in the Coral Sea. And their navigation 00:12:09.289 --> 00:12:11.830 systems show they are on a direct collision course 00:12:11.830 --> 00:12:14.529 with Sandy Island. Right. So I want you to imagine 00:12:14.529 --> 00:12:17.450 being the sailors in 2012. You're staring at 00:12:17.450 --> 00:12:20.210 GPS coordinates that insist there is a massive 00:12:20.210 --> 00:12:22.330 landmass right in front of you. But you're looking 00:12:22.330 --> 00:12:24.250 out the window and it's just open water. Exactly. 00:12:24.529 --> 00:12:27.230 The crew verified the coordinates, observed the 00:12:27.230 --> 00:12:29.429 environment, and they were sailing through miles 00:12:29.429 --> 00:12:32.309 of deep, unbroken ocean. The ocean floor there 00:12:32.309 --> 00:12:35.509 was measured at over 4 ,000 feet deep. They literally 00:12:35.509 --> 00:12:39.250 had to officially undiscover an island that global 00:12:39.250 --> 00:12:42.370 data sets insisted was real. And the propagation 00:12:42.370 --> 00:12:45.009 of that error in the digital age is basically 00:12:45.009 --> 00:12:48.149 just polygon copying. Digital mapmakers trusting 00:12:48.149 --> 00:12:50.710 the historical data without physical verification? 00:12:51.009 --> 00:12:53.710 Exactly. But the original 19th century sighting 00:12:53.710 --> 00:12:56.629 of Sandy Island actually has a highly probable 00:12:56.629 --> 00:12:59.809 geological explanation. The pumice rafts? Yes. 00:12:59.889 --> 00:13:03.429 The Coral Sea is highly active volcanically. 00:13:03.690 --> 00:13:07.490 When a submarine volcano or a seamount erupts 00:13:07.490 --> 00:13:10.309 beneath the surface, it can eject massive quantities 00:13:10.309 --> 00:13:12.549 of pumice. Which is a volcanic rock filled with 00:13:12.549 --> 00:13:15.600 gas bubbles, so it floats? Highly buoyant. So 00:13:15.600 --> 00:13:18.559 the eruption creates this massive floating rock 00:13:18.559 --> 00:13:21.620 formation. A temporary island. Precisely. And 00:13:21.620 --> 00:13:23.600 these pumice rafts can stretch for miles. They 00:13:23.600 --> 00:13:25.460 have a dense physical structure. They reflect 00:13:25.460 --> 00:13:29.000 early sonar and radar into a 19th century whaling 00:13:29.000 --> 00:13:32.379 ship. a dark expanse of pumice, looks identical 00:13:32.379 --> 00:13:35.399 to a low -lying island. So a ship logs the coordinates, 00:13:35.500 --> 00:13:37.980 it goes on the map, and months later, the ocean 00:13:37.980 --> 00:13:40.220 currents tear the raft apart and disperse it. 00:13:40.279 --> 00:13:42.039 The island was real, it just wasn't attached 00:13:42.039 --> 00:13:45.500 to the ocean floor. And this concept of untethered 00:13:45.500 --> 00:13:48.679 or disappearing geology clarifies several historical 00:13:48.679 --> 00:13:52.139 anomalies, like Bermesia in the Gulf of Mexico, 00:13:52.320 --> 00:13:54.889 claimed by Spain in the 16th century. Right. 00:13:54.970 --> 00:13:57.549 It was on maps consistently for decades before 00:13:57.549 --> 00:14:00.370 seemingly just vanishing by the late 17th century. 00:14:00.529 --> 00:14:02.870 And the mystery of Bermuda actually triggered 00:14:02.870 --> 00:14:05.990 a massive geopolitical survey in 2009. By the 00:14:05.990 --> 00:14:08.450 Mexican government? Yes, because if Bermuda still 00:14:08.450 --> 00:14:11.190 existed, it would drastically extend Mexico's 00:14:11.190 --> 00:14:14.070 maritime borders and give them access to the 00:14:14.070 --> 00:14:17.309 Hoyo de Monterrey oil reserves. The stakes of 00:14:17.309 --> 00:14:19.490 an island's existence do not get much higher 00:14:19.490 --> 00:14:22.029 than sovereign oil rights. But the 2009 survey 00:14:22.029 --> 00:14:24.909 found absolutely nothing. logical theory there 00:14:24.909 --> 00:14:27.490 isn't a pumice raft no the theory is tectonic 00:14:27.490 --> 00:14:30.110 subsidence it was likely a legitimate low -lying 00:14:30.110 --> 00:14:33.009 landmass but shifts in the tectonic plates caused 00:14:33.009 --> 00:14:35.250 the ocean floor beneath it to drop completely 00:14:35.250 --> 00:14:37.590 submerging the island which is terrifying you 00:14:37.590 --> 00:14:39.769 see similar catastrophic geology with saxonburg 00:14:39.769 --> 00:14:42.570 island too cited repeatedly between 1804 and 00:14:42.570 --> 00:14:45.389 1816 midway between south america and africa 00:14:45.389 --> 00:14:48.370 and then subsequent voyages arrive and the ocean 00:14:48.370 --> 00:14:51.100 is just empty The assessment there points to 00:14:51.100 --> 00:14:54.159 a volcanic island that experienced an explosive 00:14:54.159 --> 00:14:57.600 caldera collapsing eruption. It effectively destroyed 00:14:57.600 --> 00:15:00.360 itself, much like Krakatoa, but just out in total 00:15:00.360 --> 00:15:03.519 isolation. The scientific reality that an island 00:15:03.519 --> 00:15:06.080 can physically detonate or sink beneath the waves 00:15:06.080 --> 00:15:09.620 really adds a layer of complexity here. It suggests 00:15:09.620 --> 00:15:11.940 that our historical data isn't always flawed. 00:15:12.700 --> 00:15:14.960 Sometimes the Earth just removes the evidence. 00:15:15.159 --> 00:15:17.559 It fundamentally alters how you view navigation. 00:15:18.299 --> 00:15:20.879 Because it proves that aggregated data is entirely 00:15:20.879 --> 00:15:23.240 dependent on the rigor of the last person who 00:15:23.240 --> 00:15:25.570 physically verified it. And the historical record 00:15:25.570 --> 00:15:27.769 proves that the people compiling that data were 00:15:27.769 --> 00:15:30.730 often, well, highly compromised. Which introduces 00:15:30.730 --> 00:15:33.330 the most calculated category of phantom islands, 00:15:33.669 --> 00:15:36.490 the deliberate fabrications. No, frauds. Cartography 00:15:36.490 --> 00:15:38.710 was frequently weaponized for financial gain 00:15:38.710 --> 00:15:41.529 or legal protection. Robert E. Peary's expedition 00:15:41.529 --> 00:15:44.529 in 1906 is the definitive example of cartographic 00:15:44.529 --> 00:15:47.409 fraud. He was a highly ambitious Arctic explorer 00:15:47.409 --> 00:15:49.590 pushing toward the North Pole. Right. And during 00:15:49.590 --> 00:15:52.110 this expedition, he reported the discovery of 00:15:52.110 --> 00:15:54.309 a massive, previously uncharted... continent 00:15:54.309 --> 00:15:57.330 north of Canada. Which he formally named Crockerland. 00:15:57.590 --> 00:15:59.710 And that name is the key to unraveling the whole 00:15:59.710 --> 00:16:03.049 scam. George Crocker was a prominent banker and 00:16:03.049 --> 00:16:06.009 one of Peary's primary financial backers. Peary 00:16:06.009 --> 00:16:09.590 basically used the blank spaces on the map as 00:16:09.590 --> 00:16:12.629 a financial instrument. He fabricated a massive 00:16:12.629 --> 00:16:16.110 landmass and named it after his benefactor. He 00:16:16.110 --> 00:16:18.789 exploited the ego -driven nature of Gilded Age 00:16:18.789 --> 00:16:21.799 exploration funding. He presented Crockerland 00:16:21.799 --> 00:16:25.480 as a verified reality solely to secure a massive 00:16:25.480 --> 00:16:27.940 influx of cash for his next trip. He literally 00:16:27.940 --> 00:16:30.980 monetized a phantom continent. It is such a brazen 00:16:30.980 --> 00:16:33.220 manipulation. Yeah. But the explorers out in 00:16:33.220 --> 00:16:34.799 the field weren't the only ones manipulating 00:16:34.799 --> 00:16:37.279 the map. No, the cartographers operating out 00:16:37.279 --> 00:16:39.519 of publishing houses in London and Paris were 00:16:39.519 --> 00:16:42.159 systematically inventing geography to protect 00:16:42.159 --> 00:16:44.419 their intellectual property. The plagiarism traps. 00:16:44.779 --> 00:16:47.419 Yes. We see this practice continuing today with 00:16:47.419 --> 00:16:49.580 digital mapping. They call them paper towns. 00:16:49.870 --> 00:16:52.289 Right. Fake streets or towns. But the origins 00:16:52.289 --> 00:16:54.970 are rooted in maritime partography. Producing 00:16:54.970 --> 00:16:57.929 an accurate map in the 18th or 19th century took 00:16:57.929 --> 00:17:00.250 a massive investment of capital. Commissioning 00:17:00.250 --> 00:17:03.090 ships, hiring surveyors, engraving the copper 00:17:03.090 --> 00:17:06.529 plates. So to stop rival publishing houses from 00:17:06.529 --> 00:17:09.549 just copying their finished work, mapmakers would 00:17:09.549 --> 00:17:13.170 intentionally embed a completely fictitious island 00:17:13.170 --> 00:17:15.849 or reef into the deep ocean on their charts. 00:17:16.109 --> 00:17:18.809 It's an ingenious application of copyright enforcement. 00:17:19.079 --> 00:17:21.680 Yeah. Because if a competitor publishes a map 00:17:21.680 --> 00:17:24.220 featuring that exact same non -existent reef 00:17:24.220 --> 00:17:27.359 at the precise longitude and latitude you invented. 00:17:27.619 --> 00:17:30.160 The plagiarism is mathematically undeniable. 00:17:30.160 --> 00:17:33.099 Exactly. The Phantom Island serves as an undeniable 00:17:33.099 --> 00:17:35.730 fingerprint of theft in a court of law. And the 00:17:35.730 --> 00:17:37.829 cultural consequence of these copyright traps 00:17:37.829 --> 00:17:39.970 is that they occasionally bled into the public 00:17:39.970 --> 00:17:41.750 consciousness. Oh, the Jules Verne connection. 00:17:42.069 --> 00:17:44.990 Yes. Partographers mapping the Pacific Line Islands 00:17:44.990 --> 00:17:47.930 invented the Ernest Le Gouve reef and the Maria 00:17:47.930 --> 00:17:50.150 Theresa reef purely as intellectual property 00:17:50.150 --> 00:17:52.849 traps. But the French author Jules Verne studied 00:17:52.849 --> 00:17:55.369 those exact maps while doing research for his 00:17:55.369 --> 00:17:57.509 novels. Assuming the reefs were real discoveries. 00:17:57.650 --> 00:18:00.349 So Verne used them as the primary settings for 00:18:00.349 --> 00:18:02.789 his classics, The Mysterious Island and In Search 00:18:02.789 --> 00:18:05.140 of the Castaways. That is incredible. Because 00:18:05.140 --> 00:18:08.140 of a mapmaker's legal trap, millions of readers 00:18:08.140 --> 00:18:10.920 integrated these phantom reefs into their understanding 00:18:10.920 --> 00:18:13.640 of the world. If we connect this to the bigger 00:18:13.640 --> 00:18:16.640 picture, it really dismantles the notion that 00:18:16.640 --> 00:18:19.539 mapmaking was this purely objective scientific 00:18:19.539 --> 00:18:22.980 endeavor. Absolutely. Cartography was an ecosystem. 00:18:23.180 --> 00:18:26.099 It was influenced by atmospheric physics, limitations 00:18:26.099 --> 00:18:29.099 in chronometer technology, the demands of treaties, 00:18:29.380 --> 00:18:32.259 the desperate economics of exploration, and copyright 00:18:32.259 --> 00:18:35.029 law. The Atlas was just a battleground for all 00:18:35.029 --> 00:18:36.970 of these competing forces. It really was. And 00:18:36.970 --> 00:18:39.829 that synthesis effectively summarizes the scope 00:18:39.829 --> 00:18:42.390 of our analysis today. Reviewing the history 00:18:42.390 --> 00:18:45.009 of Phantom Islands forces a total reevaluation 00:18:45.009 --> 00:18:47.549 of spatial certainty. The map of the world was 00:18:47.549 --> 00:18:50.529 never a static, infallible document. It required 00:18:50.529 --> 00:18:53.289 constant, aggressive revision. Human understanding 00:18:53.289 --> 00:18:55.690 relied on the compromised visual processing of 00:18:55.690 --> 00:18:58.269 freezing sailors, the tectonic volatility of 00:18:58.269 --> 00:19:01.109 the ocean floor, and the overt financial deceptions 00:19:01.109 --> 00:19:03.609 of explorers. It highlights the iterative nature 00:19:03.609 --> 00:19:06.549 of knowledge. Every historical era operates under 00:19:06.549 --> 00:19:08.589 the assumption that its current model of reality 00:19:08.589 --> 00:19:11.589 is absolute. But the persistent charting and 00:19:11.589 --> 00:19:14.210 uncharting of these islands proves our foundational 00:19:14.210 --> 00:19:17.009 facts are often highly vulnerable to the next 00:19:17.009 --> 00:19:19.650 wave of technological verification. Exactly. 00:19:19.849 --> 00:19:23.549 So what does this all mean? For you, analyzing 00:19:23.549 --> 00:19:25.869 this from the vantage point of the digital age, 00:19:26.069 --> 00:19:28.809 it's a reminder that the data points we consume 00:19:28.809 --> 00:19:32.130 and trust implicitly. The blue dots on our screens. 00:19:32.369 --> 00:19:34.730 Right. The digital boundaries of our world. They 00:19:34.730 --> 00:19:37.109 are just placeholders. They represent our most 00:19:37.109 --> 00:19:39.849 accurate current model, but they are always subject 00:19:39.849 --> 00:19:43.029 to revision the moment a modern research vessel 00:19:43.029 --> 00:19:45.190 sails through the coordinates and finds open 00:19:45.190 --> 00:19:48.730 water. And to push that concept of spatial epistemology 00:19:48.730 --> 00:19:51.710 to its logical extreme, consider the legacy of 00:19:51.710 --> 00:19:54.769 the Rupes Nigra. Oh, man. In the 14th century, 00:19:54.890 --> 00:19:56.890 long before the scientific community developed 00:19:56.890 --> 00:19:59.890 an understanding of electromagnetism, cartographers 00:19:59.890 --> 00:20:02.269 faced a critical problem. They needed to explain 00:20:02.269 --> 00:20:04.769 why compass needles uniformly pointed north. 00:20:04.890 --> 00:20:07.480 Right. To resolve this massive gap in scientific 00:20:07.480 --> 00:20:10.200 knowledge, influential cartographers, including 00:20:10.200 --> 00:20:12.940 Gerardus Mercator, simply invented a geographic 00:20:12.940 --> 00:20:15.640 solution. They just made something up. They charted 00:20:15.640 --> 00:20:19.079 a massive, indestructible, black magnetic mountain, 00:20:19.319 --> 00:20:22.819 the Rupes Nigra, and positioned it exactly at 00:20:22.819 --> 00:20:25.240 the magnetic North Pole. No explorer had ever 00:20:25.240 --> 00:20:27.700 seen it. Never. It was willed into existence 00:20:27.700 --> 00:20:30.420 on the map purely to provide a physical mechanism 00:20:30.420 --> 00:20:32.980 for a force they could not comprehend. They fabricated 00:20:32.980 --> 00:20:35.480 a continent to stabilize their mathematical models. 00:20:35.640 --> 00:20:37.500 Precisely. Which leaves us with an essential 00:20:37.500 --> 00:20:39.779 question regarding our own era of information 00:20:39.779 --> 00:20:43.480 processing. In an age characterized by massive 00:20:43.480 --> 00:20:46.940 data aggregation and complex, opaque algorithms, 00:20:47.240 --> 00:20:50.279 what imaginary structures are we currently building 00:20:50.279 --> 00:20:51.960 into our models just to explain the phenomena 00:20:51.960 --> 00:20:54.279 we do not yet have the capacity to understand? 00:20:54.500 --> 00:20:56.859 A vital framework for evaluating our own certainties. 00:20:57.000 --> 00:20:59.099 Thank you for joining us as we navigated the 00:20:59.099 --> 00:21:00.920 history of the non -existent, and we will be 00:21:00.920 --> 00:21:02.400 back with another deep dive soon.