Construct · 3 fields · 3 citations
One name. Different field. Different construct. One map.
● jingle · one word, three constructs Nearest construct by meaningscalingcompare the meaningsEvery construct on the map is compared with every other by the meaning of its definitions, and the closest one is surfaced here. The nearest construct to scale is scaling.
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A rule for assigning numbers to objects or events according to a convention, so that the numbers stand in for an attribute the object carries. In On the theory of scales of measurement (1946), Stevens sorted these rules into four levels: nominal (numbers as labels), ordinal (numbers as rank), interval (equal steps but an arbitrary zero), and ratio (a true zero, so ratios hold). The referent is the mapping itself, a many-to-one assignment from things to numerals, and the unit is whatever the rule permits, which is why what counts as a meaningful operation (a mean, a ratio) depends on the level. A rating scale in a questionnaire is the everyday case: a fixed set of numbered responses standing in for how much of an attitude a person holds.[1]
An ordered series of pitches rising or falling within an octave, from which the melodies and harmonies of a passage are drawn. In Piston's Harmony (1987) the scale is the ladder of tones a key is built on: the major scale and the several forms of the minor scale set the intervals between adjacent steps, and those intervals fix which chords sound at home in the key. The referent is a sequence of sounds, not a number, and the ordering is by pitch, ear-perceptible, not by the magnitude of any measured attribute. It shares the word with the psychometric meaning and even the idea of ordered steps, but the steps here are semitones and whole tones, and nothing is being measured.[2]
The ratio of a distance on a map to the matching distance on the ground, written as a fraction (1:50,000), a statement (one centimetre to one kilometre), or a bar. In Robinson and colleagues' Elements of Cartography (1995) map scale is what makes a map a controlled reduction of the world rather than a picture: it sets how much detail can survive, and on a curved earth it varies from point to point across a projection. A large-scale map covers a small area in fine detail; a small-scale map covers a large area coarsely. The referent is a ratio between two lengths, dimensionless, and it has nothing in common with a pitch or an attitude except the shared word.[3]
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