Our brain is mapping the world. Often that map is distorted, but it’s a map with constant immediate sensory input.
This map is a cartogram where the original shapes of each territory mapped is proportional to the variable mapped. Values for more than 200 territories are used to create the map. That number of figures is far too big to be able to take in at a glance. However the brain’s visual processing skills are phenomenal, and presented as a picture you have no difficulty with that number. Before you look at a particular map, you usually have some ideas about the subject. Some of those ideas may be confirmed, other things may surprise you. You, not the cartographer, not the statistician, decide what is most striking about the figures.