Navigation

Navigation is according to the National Geographic the art and science of determining the position of a ship or plane or other vehicle and guiding it to a specific place. Consequently, navigation requires someone who can work out the vehicle location compared to other locations.

Some methods of navigation have been around for millennia such as the ancient mariners using landmarks or observing the movement of the sun and stars. Minoans who lived on Crete from 3000-1100 BC left records showing they used the stars to navigate.

At sea, mariners use a navigation method known as dead reckoning which uses the course and speed of a ship to determine its position. Piloting can also be used in narrow waterways by using geographical landmarks to determine a ship’s position.

Image of dead reckoning course plot

Navigating on land whether on foot or in a vehicle involves the use of maps, reading the terrain, referring to a compass and landmarks such as hills or buildings to identify location. If you are in a town or city then maps that feature bus routes, train stations and underground stations are also accessed to provide information of location.

Celestial navigation or astronavigation involves the use of the sun, moon, stars, constellations and the horizon using an instrument such as a sextant to calculate position and location when travelling on the open sea which has no landmarks to aid navigation. A navigator needs to be aware of the different stars and constellations in the northern and southern hemispheres. For example, the Southern Cross constellation appears only in the southern hemisphere and the Plough constellation appears only in the northern hemisphere.

Other forms of navigation include the use of a satellite system called global positioning system or GPS. This system is owned and financed by the American government’s Department of Defence but anyone with a GPS receiver can use it. The GPS is a form of radio navigation and provides very accurate location and position information for the GPS receiver. This form of navigation can be used at sea or on land.

Navigation is not confined to travelling on land, sea or air. People navigate their way around their email inbox identifying which emails to answer, which to prioritise and which to ignore and/or delete. Indeed, people now have to navigate their way around websites of all descriptions whether in work or for personal use.

In fact, there are four types of website navigation. The first is the top menu which is the main website navigation bar usually at the head of the website page. The next navigation aid is the footer menu which may have a lot of information or just basic site information.

Image of footer menu navigation aid

The third type is the side bar which is used in ecommerce and information heavy sites such as blogs. The sidebars can be on the left or the right of the screen page. The fourth type of website navigation is called breadcrumbs which are hierarchical that show how pages are nested within each other. Breadcrumbs are good for helping users find their way around within a website of specific interest to them such as online shopping websites.

Indeed, any organisation or business uses navigation to identify issues, plot course corrections and develop new ways of implementing services or products. Governments too, whether local or national, also use navigation tools to find out what voters are thinking regarding policies or voting intentions in a forthcoming election.

These methods can include focus groups, survey research using samples and populations, opinion polls, mail surveys, telephone surveys, interest groups or lobbying and protests such as marches to measure public opinion. From these methods policy documents, laws and manifesto declarations can be identified and implemented.

Which brings us to the present day and the current government is preparing to navigate its way around the ongoing unrest in Britain over issues such as legal and illegal immigration, open borders, two tier policing, the integration of communities with conflicting and contradictory belief systems, the axing of winter fuel payments for pensioners, net zero costs and the impending increases in taxes for the people of Britain.

How the Labour government navigates its way around these issues will determine whether it remains in power. The future of Britain as a stable, unified and functioning country is at stake as it could all too easily descend into a balkanised failed state.

Navigating the Alphabet (children’s poem)

To get from A to B to C
I’ll have to take a compass
with me and D to E to F I’ll need
a map but I’ve left it on the
shelf. So from G to H to I I’ll
be guided by the sun in the
sky. From there I’ll travel to
J and K and L so I’d better make
sure I locate a hotel and after a
hearty breakfast it’s off to M and
N and O where I’ll have a much

better route to go. Then on to
P, Q and R and a night spent
reading the stars and off to S
T and U where the cliffs and
the sea provide an amazing
view and onwards to W, X, Y
and Z where after a tiring
day out it’s time for bed. And in
the morning it’s all the way back
to A, B and C for you and me.

Thanks for reading and please leave a comment as they are always appreciated. Dermot.