Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!lll-winken!bert.llnl.gov!howell From: howell@bert.llnl.gov (Louis Howell) Newsgroups: comp.misc Subject: Re: Left Handed programmers (was Sinister Hackers 8-)) Message-ID: <1990Aug20.084113@bert.llnl.gov> Date: 20 Aug 90 15:41:13 GMT References: <1488@chinacat.Unicom.COM> <19624@well.sf.ca.us> <12772@hydra.gatech.EDU> Sender: usenet@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV Reply-To: howell@bert.llnl.gov (Louis Howell) Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Lines: 29 First, the opinions: I tend to react to all the left brain/right brain BS the same way I react to people who sharpen their razor blades with a pyramid. I write with my left hand, but I don't think there's a deep reason for it, just an accident when I was learning to write that grew into a habit. I use scissors with my right hand because virtually all scissors are built that way. I use a mouse with my right hand because the default placing on a public terminal is to the right. A pencil, however, has no preferred orientation. Here's my theory about left-handed hackers. These people are drawn from a pool which tended to be early achievers. Most of them were encouraged to draw, and may have actually learned to write, before they entered school. Their "handedness" is therefore essentially random, 50-50. The unwashed masses, however, mostly learned to write in school and, lacking any clear preference, were encouraged to use their right hand, the default choice. That's all. A simple explanation that doesn't require any New Age psychobabble about which side of the brain you pick your nose with. It could well be wrong, but without strong evidence I'll prefer the explanation which doesn't postulate some mysterious neurological tendency, every time. Louis Howell #include