{"id":63709,"date":"2015-09-14T12:00:17","date_gmt":"2015-09-14T11:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=63709"},"modified":"2015-09-14T01:58:22","modified_gmt":"2015-09-14T00:58:22","slug":"why-some-people-are-left-handed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2015\/09\/why-some-people-are-left-handed\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Some People Are Left-Handed"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>An evolutionary parable of how the contradictory forces of competition and cooperation shaped human destiny.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Your two hands are radically different from the other \u2014 not only in <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2015\/05\/01\/follow-your-gut-rob-knight\/\" >the distinct microbial populations they carry<\/a> but in their cultural baggage as well. The symbolism of the right hand as the doer and the left as the dreamer compelled the pioneering Harvard psychologist Jerome Bruner to write <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2014\/04\/21\/jerome-bruner-on-knowing-left-hand-creativity\/\" >an entire book<\/a> about it \u2014 one of the most insightful books ever written, no less. Even as modern science disperses centuries-old superstition, <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2014\/04\/21\/jerome-bruner-on-knowing-left-hand-creativity\/\" >the evolutionary mystery of handedness<\/a> continues to fascinate.<\/p>\n<p>The enduring enigma of why a tenth of all humans are left-handed is what the fine folks at <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/ed.ted.com\/\" >TED-Ed<\/a> distill in this animated primer:<\/p>\n<p>httpv:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=TGLYcYCm2FM<\/p>\n<p><em>Handedness seems to be determined by a roll of the dice, but the odds are set by your genes.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Dive deeper into the scientific detective story of left-handedness <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2014\/04\/21\/jerome-bruner-on-knowing-left-hand-creativity\/\" >here<\/a>, then revisit other stimulating TED-Ed animations exploring <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2014\/11\/28\/against-happiness-melancholy-wilson\/\" >how melancholy enhances creativity<\/a>, <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2015\/04\/28\/what-makes-a-hero-joseph-campbell-monomyth\/\" >what makes a hero<\/a>, <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2015\/04\/10\/how-do-you-know-you-exist-descartes-ted-ed\/\" >how you know you exist<\/a>, and <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2014\/09\/18\/on-repeat-margulis\/\" >why playing music benefits your brain more than any other activity<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>________________________________<\/p>\n<p><em>Brain Pickings<\/em><em> is the brain child of Maria Popova, an interestingness hunter-gatherer and curious mind at large obsessed with combinatorial creativity who also writes for <\/em><em>Wired<\/em><em> UK and <\/em><em>The Atlantic<\/em><em>, among others, and is an MIT Futures of Entertainment Fellow. She has gotten occasional help from a handful of <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/index.php\/about\/authors\/\" >guest contributors<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.brainpickings.org\/2015\/09\/08\/why-some-people-are-left-handed\/?mc_cid=f044b3eacc&amp;mc_eid=f209d58223\" >Go to Original \u2013 brainpickings.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An evolutionary parable of how the contradictory forces of competition and cooperation shaped human destiny.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[145],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63709","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63709","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63709\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}