The technology of controlled movement across open water — from Polynesian star-path wayfinding to Arab dhow routes across the Indian Ocean to European oceanic exploration — that connected distant civilizations, enabled global trade and empire, and made the modern world's geographic integration possible
Navigation is the technology that made the world one world. Before reliable methods of open-ocean navigation, human civilizations were geographically isolated from each other or connected only by land. After navigation, the oceans became highways rather than barriers. The Polynesian settlement of the Pacific, the Arab dhow networks of the Indian Ocean, and the European oceanic voyages of the 15th century all depended on navigation technologies: the ability to determine position, set course, and return — across hundreds or thousands of miles of open water where landmarks do not exist. Navigation did not discover the world. It connected it.