Uncertainty

The representations that constitute the bulk of geographic knowledge must leave their users uncertain to some degree about the nature of the real world. Knowledge of geographic uncertainty is essential in geographic research, in decision-making, and in everyday life. A variety of methods have been devised for measuring the degree of uncertainty inherent in geographic information. Models of uncertainty make use of the theoretical constructs of fuzzy and rough sets, spatial statistics, and geostatistics. Much progress has been made in recent years in developing methods for visualizing uncertainty and for analyzing its propagation into the results of geographic research. Progress has also been made on the description of quality in data documentation, and in the use of dataset quality as a dimension of the processes of search and discovery.