5 | 1 | 2024 The Art of Mapping Between Land and Mind

Abstract

This issue of the Journal for the Philosophy of Language, Mind and the Arts perhaps stems from what might be an excess of presentism. It originates, that is, from the consideration of several unrelated events or processes, all of which occurred after the beginning of this century, that have to do with a renewed relevance of cartography and its expressive forms.By the end of the twentieth century, we seemed to have grown accustomed to a world whose mappable surface was, on the whole, stable and perhaps even exhausted, but at this moment the horizon we are moving towards appears more uncertain. The active war fronts in Ukraine and Russia, and between Israel and Palestine, as well as the potential for conflict on European soil, or between the USA and China, and the significant Chinese influence on the African continent, all foreshadow a disruption of global borders unprecedented since the end of the Cold War.If we indulge in increasingly less science-fiction fantasies, we can imagine that the new race for interplanetary missions, also promoted by private companies like SpaceX, Virgin Galactic, or Blue Origin, will not only expand the realm of mappability but also its styles and techniques. 1 The same can be said about metaverses and virtual worlds, which promise to become new realms for human life and interactions.