For example on wikipedia for Switzerland it says the country has an area of 41,285 km². Does this take into account that a lot of that area is actually angled at a steep inclination, thus the actual surface area is in effect larger than what you would expect when looking onto a map in satellite view?
No. It’s a flat approximation. The short answer is that once you take account for topography, your answer will always grow with surface resolution, and thus the actual surface area of rough topography is undefined.
I can’t remember if it was Matt Parker or Tom Scott who did a thing about this on youtube, and I think the answer was no, they just use whatever method is easiest to get these numbers, and they’re not even using a consistent methodology from one country to the next.
I can’t remember if it was Matt Parker
the south park guy?
created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone
oh.
Matt Parker, stand-up mathematician.
Colleague of Trey Stone.
