Mountains' heights potentially miscalculated?
Kai Xu, a doctoral student at New York University, has introduced a novel method for measuring mountains called Jut, which has sparked a lively debate among mountaineers, hikers, and geographers.
Xu, who was captivated by the view of Mount Tom, a 13,652-foot peak in California's Eastern Sierra Nevada range as a teenager, published a paper detailing his new metric on arXiv.org about a year after his visit to the Sierras.
Jut takes into account both a mountain's height above its surroundings and the steepness of its rise. This unique approach sets it apart from traditional methods of mountain ranking. Xu's system ranks Mount Everest, the world's ostensibly loftiest peak, 46th, while he crowns Annapurna Fang, a 25,089-foot Himalayan peak with 11,1194 feet of jut, as the world's actual most impressive summit.
Xu's website, peakjut.com, allows users to surf customizable lists of mountains ranked by jut, search by location for high-jut peaks, and find coordinates for a mountain's most impressive viewpoint. The site also features a worldwide "heat map" of jut, created by software developer and backpacker Noah Lomas earlier this year.
The jut map has already helped discover a spectacular, yet obscure mountain in the Sierra Mazateca region, near the border of Puebla and Oaxaca, Mexico.
Xu's inspiration for Jut came from the concept of prominence and a more recent metric called ORS (omnidirectional relief and steepness). His method, called viewpoint impressiveness, reduces the number based on the angle of view. The concept is intricate but straightforward: it finds the sweet spot where height and angle of slope combine to create the most impressive view.
To promote Jut, Xu posted on mountaineering and geography boards on Reddit, explaining how his new system worked. He compared photos to show how a peak like Wyoming's Grand Teton, with high jut, is more stirring than some taller peaks with less jut.
Xu's method has reignited debates among mountaineers, hikers, and geographers over what makes a mountain great. While some argue that traditional measures of height and prominence should remain the standard, others are intrigued by the potential of Jut to reveal remote subranges and unnamed summits using artificial intelligence.
The person who developed the "jut" system is Karel de Vos, although Xu has refined and popularised it. As a teenager, Xu spent hours scrolling through Google Earth, zooming in on well-known peaks, poring over their contours and elevations. Now, with Jut, he invites others to do the same and experience the world's mountains in a new light.
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