Author Topic: Happy Left Handers Day  (Read 7831 times)

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #25 on: 13 August, 2019, 08:35:54 pm »
An ex-girlfriend is an identical twin. She is right handed, her sister is left handed. Apparently, this is not uncommon amongst twins.
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Mrs Pingu

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #26 on: 13 August, 2019, 08:45:42 pm »
I'm reasonably ambidextrous with screwdrivers[1]
[1] I only recently discovered that this was in any way unusual.

This is me. Lefty loosey lefty, righty tighty righty. Makes perfect sense. Squicks Pingu out.
LH: writing, using a fork, using a kitchen knife, typing on a tablet
RH: mouse, scissors.
Everything else: all equally rubbish on both sides
Do not clench. It only makes it worse.

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #27 on: 13 August, 2019, 08:52:35 pm »
I write with my left, use a hammer with my left, hold a rifle to my left shoulder, but throw with my right.

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #28 on: 13 August, 2019, 08:54:25 pm »
Don't ever try the sport of hammer-throwing, then.

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #29 on: 13 August, 2019, 08:56:28 pm »
Don't ever try the sport of hammer-throwing, then.
;D

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #30 on: 13 August, 2019, 08:58:32 pm »
I'm very strongly left handed, but sometimesI have to use my right hand because there's no way to do the job left handed (it's a problem of access with some mechanical tasks).
However, I can only use a computer mouse with my right hand.
I can draw reasonably well with my right hand; in drawing lessons, when we were told to change hands in order to challenge set patterns of working I usually got a bollocking for ignoring the instruction.

Kim

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #31 on: 13 August, 2019, 10:22:13 pm »
Viewfinders/telescopic sights with the left eye.

Ah yes - I'm left eyed and right-handed.  Which means I'm inherently bad with guns.

Fortunately this hasn't really been a problem.

Feanor

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #32 on: 13 August, 2019, 10:35:35 pm »
I'm mostly lefty here.

Things that require fine motor control like writing and holding a soldering iron is LH.
But things that need some oomph, like larger hand tools, I use the right.

Shrug.



Gus

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #33 on: 14 August, 2019, 05:48:36 am »
I'm very strongly left handed, but sometimesI have to use my right hand because there's no way to do the job left handed (it's a problem of access with some mechanical tasks).
However, I can only use a computer mouse with my right hand.
Me too, any handtools in my right hand seems to become a weopon, that will make me bleed.
My Kitchen is filled with left handed equipment much to my amusement, egen my right handed friends try to  cans with a left handed can opener.

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #34 on: 14 August, 2019, 08:37:28 am »
I'm reasonably ambidextrous with screwdrivers[1] and soldering irons,
[1] I only recently discovered that this was in any way unusual.

Is it unusual? Surely this sort of thing is defined by how easy it is to access a space to get a tool in? Screwdrivers, spanners, hammers, all tools really - everyone must surely use those with either hand depending on where the space is, no?

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #35 on: 14 August, 2019, 10:33:09 am »
Write with left, hold mouse in left, use scissors in right (but left hand does the fine-control thing with the paper).

I use knife and fork like a dexter, but hold a spoon in my left hand.  After all, it's my left hand that goes towards my mouth.  If using just a fork, I'll hold that in my left hand - to me, it's just an obvious extension of using k+f, just without the k.  In fact, it was only recently that I noticed that dexters tend to switch to holding a fork in their right hand if they're not using a knife - what's the rationale behind that?

Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #36 on: 14 August, 2019, 11:04:25 am »
From a limited search, it seems the left-right handedness is either weakly or not inherited.
Quote
Even the genetics are odd – only about 25% of children who have two left-handed parents will also be left-handed.

And lots of other interesting stuff about what left-handedness does or more frequently does not mean: https://theconversation.com/being-left-handed-doesnt-mean-you-are-right-brained-so-what-does-it-mean-121711

Based on ten entire minutes of Googling, it seems that really there's no difference between left and right hand dominance – and most of us are ambidextrous to a degree – whether you go one way or the other seems mostly down to random events and they way we learn, and the general raised level of impracticalities that lefties find, such as smearing ink. Most people choose a side and go with it, and they quickly lose muscle memory and stamina on the other side.
If it was just random, we'd be 50/50 left and right. If it was to do with smearing ink, most Arabs and Israelis would be left handed.
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

ian

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #37 on: 14 August, 2019, 11:29:12 am »
Not really, given the world favours right-handedness in many small ways (or which writing is one), it's reasonable to expect a non-50:50 pattern of handedness. Looking at a few twin studies, it seems any heritable component is minimal to non-existent (nor is it learned behaviour from your parents).

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #38 on: 14 August, 2019, 12:16:34 pm »
... it seems any heritable component is minimal to non-existent (nor is it learned behaviour from your parents).

Interesting.

Anecdata; my mother and Mrs E's father were left handed. One of Mrs E's sisters is left handed. That's two lefties out of six in our generation. In the next two generations (kids and grandkids), a total of eighteen, there are no left handers. That's lower tha average, whic I think is about 10%, therefore one would assume that there would be one or two lefties.

Woofage

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #39 on: 14 August, 2019, 12:22:06 pm »
An ex-girlfriend is an identical twin. She is right handed, her sister is left handed. Apparently, this is not uncommon amongst twins.

Mirror twins. I know a pair.

In very rare cases internal organs can be mirrored too :o.
Pen Pusher

Kim

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #40 on: 14 August, 2019, 12:25:00 pm »
I'm reasonably ambidextrous with screwdrivers[1] and soldering irons,
[1] I only recently discovered that this was in any way unusual.

Is it unusual? Surely this sort of thing is defined by how easy it is to access a space to get a tool in? Screwdrivers, spanners, hammers, all tools really - everyone must surely use those with either hand depending on where the space is, no?

No idea.  If I had to guess, I'd bet on it being a generational thing, with younger people only getting limited experience of tool use, generally on smaller, easily rotated objects like computers and bicycles, rather than things like houses and cars.

I did some left-handed hammering the other day.  I'm surprisingly bad at it.

Woofage

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #41 on: 14 August, 2019, 12:25:59 pm »
I'm a bit all over the place. I write as a righty but eat as a lefty. Apparently I tie my shoe laces as a lefty too (whatever that means). Can't write left-handed though.

Mum told me that my Dad was ambidextrous. His family are all lefties.
Pen Pusher

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #42 on: 14 August, 2019, 12:28:24 pm »
I'm reasonably ambidextrous with screwdrivers[1]
[1] I only recently discovered that this was in any way unusual.

This is me. Lefty loosey lefty, righty tighty righty. Makes perfect sense. Squicks Pingu out...

I just think it's sinister.

hellymedic

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #43 on: 14 August, 2019, 12:42:12 pm »
An ex-girlfriend is an identical twin. She is right handed, her sister is left handed. Apparently, this is not uncommon amongst twins.

Mirror twins. I know a pair.

In very rare cases internal organs can be mirrored too :o.

I also know some mirror twins. I've no idea about their internals.

AIUI situs inversus is rare and usually fraught with medical complications.

My observation of smalls is that hand dominance occurs BEFORE they are using chiral objects.

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #44 on: 14 August, 2019, 01:01:45 pm »
Not really, given the world favours right-handedness in many small ways (or which writing is one), it's reasonable to expect a non-50:50 pattern of handedness. Looking at a few twin studies, it seems any heritable component is minimal to non-existent (nor is it learned behaviour from your parents).
But if people were born 50/50 left and right handed, why would there be a preference in tools etc for one handedness over the other?

Handedness exists in other primates, eg:
Quote
Comparative analysis indicated that chimpanzees and bonobos show population-level right handedness, whereas gorillas and orangutans do not. All ape species showed evidence of population-level handedness when considering specific tasks. Familial analyses in chimpanzees indicated that offspring and maternal (but not paternal) handedness was significantly positively correlated, but this finding was contingent upon the classification criteria used to evaluate hand preference. Overall, the proportion of right handedness is lower in great apes compared with humans, and various methodological and theoretical explanations for this discrepancy are discussed.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2063575/

and Helly observes handedness in very smalls. It seems more likely that we're just born primarily right-handed. Perhaps there is some evolutionary advantage on a population level to having most of the species handed in the same way?
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

Kim

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #45 on: 14 August, 2019, 01:08:27 pm »
On occasion medics (and stupider pseudomedics operating for the DWP or similar) have been known to ask barakta if she's right-handed.  This always seems like an overly philosophical question; it's not like she's lost the use of a limb in adulthood.

ian

Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #46 on: 14 August, 2019, 01:21:36 pm »

But if people were born 50/50 left and right handed, why would there be a preference in tools etc for one handedness over the other?
...
and Helly observes handedness in very smalls. It seems more likely that we're just born primarily right-handed. Perhaps there is some evolutionary advantage on a population level to having most of the species handed in the same way?

It's an interesting question, but I think once there's a small benefit to going one way or the other, it gets amplified by design and environmental choices (the same happens in evolution, but I think can applied to non-heritable phenotypes). There must be an overall selective benefit in handedness itself, otherwise you wouldn't see it in other primates, but not in which hand is dominant. I'd speculate the benefit on handedness in tasks is the focus – both on building the neural structures for fine control (on either side of the brain) and the basic stamina and strength to perform that task.

redshift

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #47 on: 14 August, 2019, 01:22:37 pm »
Viewfinders/telescopic sights with the left eye.

Ah yes - I'm left eyed and right-handed.  Which means I'm inherently bad with guns.

Fortunately this hasn't really been a problem.

A gun range safety officer told me to ignore any issues like that - if I wanted to become truly efficient, I should learn to shoot with both eyes and both hands.  "What happens when you're hiding around the wrong-handed corner?" he said.  Not really a problem for someone who only went shooting a couple of times.

As for the rest,
Lefty - writing, Frisbee, small hammer, hand axe, carving and craft tools, snooker / pool, football
Righty - hitting things with sticks / bats / racquets, throwing, guitar, mouse, eating irons, big hammer / pickaxe / axe, martial arts weapons*

I can never tell until I actually try something whether I'll be left or right handed at it, but generally it seems to be fine motor control on the left and power on the right.


*Which of course are practised both sides even when they're not, such as Japanese sword arts.
L
:)
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hellymedic

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #48 on: 14 August, 2019, 01:24:55 pm »
My left-handed sister and her left-handed husband have four sons. only one of whom is left-handed.

I cannot imagine they foisted right-handedness on their smalls and this tends to emerge before schools and schooling have any influence.

Most humans are right-handed for whatever reason.

Kim

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Re: Happy Left Handers Day
« Reply #49 on: 14 August, 2019, 01:25:31 pm »
Presumably there's a benefit to consistent handedness once working in groups with tools becomes a thing.  I'm thinking clobbering animals to DETH with sticks without hitting your friends, rather than the practicalities of sharing scissors.