It is a challenge to decide which quotation to put first. Here they are in chronological order. Suggesting perhaps some filiation.
A map is not the territory it represents, but, if correct, it has a similar structure to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness.
Alfred Korzybski, Science and Sanity
No, no. don’t say where we are! Once we know where we are, then the world becomes as narrow as a map. When we don’t know, the world feels unlimited.
Okay. Then let’s do our best to get lost.
Cixin Liu. The Dark Forest trans. Joel Martinsen
Thus I come to the conclusion that map is like metaphor, a structure for exploration. And there is no exploration without “getting lost” which of course means “being found” elsewhere.
“But I reckon I got to light out for the Territory ahead of the rest, because Aunt Sally she’s going to adopt me and sivilize me, and I can’t stand it. I been there before.”
Mark Twain. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.
Dorothy of no-place-like-home fame
For some Oz is the homeward direction. Navigating mapless.
And so for day 2182
03.12.2012