The history of cartography is sometimes told as a steady march toward greater accuracy. Historians of science complicate this progress narrative: maps have always been made for purposes — navigation, taxation, conquest, propaganda — and what counts as accurate depends on the purpose. A subway map is not less accurate than a topographic map; the two are answering different questions. Reading maps as transparent records, scholars argue, obscures what they were actually built to do.
Which choice best states the main idea of the text?
- A
Subway maps are inaccurate.
- B
Cartography has not progressed.
- Ccheck_circle
Maps' accuracy is purpose-relative, and treating maps as transparent records obscures their functional design.
- D
All maps lie.
Explanation
The passage's central claim is that accuracy is purpose-relative — B. A misreads the example; C and D overstate.