Mr Cook said a universalmethod was needed as coastguards used latitude and longitude when they rescued at sea, and people used postcodes and street names when they gave directions.
That world began when Johannes Gutenberg introduced the printing press in 1455, and gave birth along the way to the Reformation, the Age of Reason, the Enlightenment, the Scientific Method, and finally the Industrial Revolution not to mention the modern era of newspapers, universal education and, yes, mass literacy.