On Exactitude in Science

"On Exactitude in Science" or "On Rigor in Science" edition of Borges’s Historia universal de la infamia (A
(the original Spanish-language title is "Del rigor en la Universal History of Infamy).[2] It is no longer included
ciencia") is a one-paragraph short story by Jorge Luis in current Spanish editions of the Historia universal de
Borges, about the map-territory relation, written in the la infamia, as since 1961 it has appeared as part of El
form of a literary forgery. hacedor.[3]
The names “B. Lynch Davis” and “Suarez Miranda”
would be combined later in 1946 to form another
1 Plot pseudonym, B. Suarez Lynch, under which Borges and
Bioy Casares published Un modelo para la muerte, a col-
[2]
The Borges story, credited fictionally as a quotation from lection of detective fiction.
“Suárez Miranda, Viajes de varones prudentes, Libro IV,
Cap. XLV, Lérida, 1658”, imagines an empire where
the science of cartography becomes so exact that only a
map on the same scale as the empire itself will suffice. 3 Influences and legacy
"[S]ucceeding Generations... came to judge a map of
such Magnitude cumbersome... In the western Deserts, The story elaborates on a concept in Lewis Carroll's Sylvie
tattered Fragments of the Map are still to be found, Shel- and Bruno Concluded: a fictional map that had “the scale
tering an occasional Beast or beggar...”[1] of a mile to the mile.” One of Carroll’s characters notes
... In that Empire, the Art of Cartography attained such some practical difficulties with this map and states that
Perfection that the map of a single Province occupied the “we now use the country itself, as its own map, and I as-
[4]
entirety of a City, and the map of the Empire, the en- sure you it does nearly as well.”
tirety of a Province. In time, those Unconscionable Maps “What a useful thing a pocket-map is!" I remarked.
no longer satisfied, and the Cartographers Guilds struck “That’s another thing we've learned from your Nation,”
a Map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, said Mein Herr, “map-making. But we've carried it much
and which coincided point for point with it. The follow- further than you. What do you consider the largest map
ing Generations, who were not so fond of the Study of that would be really useful?"
Cartography as their Forebears had been, saw that that “About six inches to the mile.”
vast map was Useless, and not without some Pitilessness “Only six inches!" exclaimed Mein Herr. “We very soon
was it, that they delivered it up to the Inclemencies of got to six yards to the mile. Then we tried a hundred yards
Sun and Winters. In the Deserts of the West, still today, to the mile. And then came the grandest idea of all ! We
there are Tattered Ruins of that Map, inhabited by Ani- actually made a map of the country, on the scale of a mile
mals and Beggars; in all the Land there is no other Relic to the mile!"
of the Disciplines of Geography. “Have you used it much?" I enquired.
“ “It has never been spread out, yet,” said Mein Herr: “the
” farmers objected: they said it would cover the whole
country, and shut out the sunlight ! So we now use the
country itself, as its own map, and I assure you it does
purportedly from Suárez Miranda, Travels of Prudent nearly as well.”
Men, Book Four, Ch. XLV, Lérida, 1658
“
”
2 Publication history
from Lewis Carroll, Sylvie and Bruno Concluded, Chapter
The story was first published in the March 1946 edition XI, London, 1895
of Los Anales de Buenos Aires, año 1, no. 3 as part of a Umberto Eco expanded upon the theme, quoting Borges’s
piece called “Museo” under the name B. Lynch Davis, a paragraph as the epigraph for his short story “On the Im-
joint pseudonym of Borges and Adolfo Bioy Casares; that possibility of Drawing a Map of the Empire on a Scale
piece credited it as the work of “Suarez Miranda.” It was of 1 to 1.” It was collected in Eco’s How to Travel with a
collected later that year in the 1946 second Argentinian Salmon & Other Essays.[5][6]

1
2 6 EXTERNAL LINKS

4 See also
• “The map is not the territory”

5 References
[1] J. L. Borges, A Universal History of Infamy (translated by
Norman Thomas de Giovanni), Penguin Books, London,
1975. ISBN 0-14-003959-7.

[2] http://www.borges.pitt.edu/1946

[3] http://www.borges.pitt.edu/node/144

[4] Edney, Matthew H. (2009). Mapping an Empire: The Ge-

ographical Construction of British India, 1765-1843. Uni-
versity of Chicago Press. p. 353n39. ISBN 978-0-226-
18486-9.

[5] Eco, Umberto (1995). How to Travel with a Salmon &

Other Essays. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. pp. 95–106.
ISBN 978-0-547-54043-6.

[6] Edney, Matthew H. (2009). Mapping an Empire: The Ge-

ographical Construction of British India, 1765-1843. Uni-
versity of Chicago Press. p. 353n39. ISBN 978-0-226-
18486-9.

6 External links
• Quote from story, translated by Andrew Hurley
• Spanish Audio “On Rigor in Science”
 3

7 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

7.1 Text
• On Exactitude in Science Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Exactitude_in_Science?oldid=776930079 Contributors: Bryan
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7.2 Images

7.3 Content license

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