# What is the furthest north, south, east and west you've ever been? (By Longitude please.)

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-furthest-north-south-east-and-west-youve-ever-been-by-longitude-please/1028653>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [March 21, 2026, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-furthest-north-south-east-and-west-youve-ever-been-by-longitude-please/1028653 "2026-03-21T13:51:08Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 119

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**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\
**Post date:** [March 21, 2026, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-furthest-north-south-east-and-west-youve-ever-been-by-longitude-please/1028653/119 "2026-03-21T21:17:32Z")

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> [@SCAdian](#):
>
> How can you possibly say that 180 does not separate east longitude from west longitude?

I did not say that.

You may be thinking of this quote:

> [@wolfpup](#):
>
> But there’s no “line to cross over” in that sense. If you were heading east, got to coordinate point 180°, and kept going, you’d still be heading east. The earth would still be turning in the same direction, so you’d still continue to lose one hour for every 15° of longitude. There would just be a date change at the IDL.

That was in response to the question “What is the line we can’t cross over and still call it furthest East or West?” I meant that there is no point at which heading “east” suddenly turns into heading “west”. Obviously there are two opposite longitudes on the planet at which negative longitudes becomes positive, and vice versa.

My argument with you was about this:

> Because there’s a definite difference in ‘eastness’ and ‘westness’ of your longitude. If you ignore that difference, you might as well not bother

That’s not an argument against the Prime Meridian being the reference point for longitudinal coordinates. There **is** no argument against it, because that’s what it is, by definition.

But this is turning into something of a hijack so I’m done with it.

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