5 ms·
I wouldn't have expected that the CW to tighten things convention was linked to right/lefthandedness. Especially since many people seem to not have a notion abo
by mhb 6y ago
I wouldn't have expected that the CW to tighten things convention was linked to right/lefthandedness. Especially since many people seem to not have a notion about the convention.
But maybe that's my right privilege talking.
- leetcrew 6y agoI think it's more natural to twist things thumb-over-index. index-over-thumb is a slightly awkward movement, at least for me. this corresponds with the right-hand rule (relative to your hand).
- lallysingh 6y agoYou get more power pushing with your thumb than pulling with it. My thumb is stronger over one way over the other.
- leetcrew 6y agosorry, confused myself with that bit about the "up" direction of the bag. I think we agree.
- GavinMcG 6y agoRighty tighty, lefty loosey, right? But I don't think there is a convention when it comes to twist ties, because a twist tie isn't something that gets tighter or looser. It's more closely related to spinning. I'd bet lefties spin tops counterclockwise, too, by and large. Seems to me it comes down to external rotation of the wrist being easier than internal.
- kevincox 6y agoWhen I twist something I prefer to twist the top of my hands out, so I would twist something different if I was holding the tie with my left or right hand. So I absolutely believe that the handedness affects this because it will change which hand holds the bread and which holds the twist tie. If I hold the bread in the left (twist with my right) I would twist it clockwise (righty tighty) and if I held the bread in my right I would use my left and twist counter-clockwise.
- jstanley 6y ago> Righty tighty, lefty loosey, right? This phrase always irked me, because when you're rotating something, it's not moving either left or right. The top of it moves right, the bottom moves left. Is it tightening or loosening? Further, the only time a phrase might be needed to work out which way to tighten something is when it's unusually-positioned, for example upside down or facing away from you, and in those cases "righty tighty, lefty loosey" gives exactly the wrong answer (to the extent that it gives an answer at all, since "clockwise" and "right" are not the same thing). I prefer the phrase "clockwise moves the thing you're turning away from you, anti-clockwise moves it towards you", which I'm hoping will catch on.
- wl 6y agoI've adopted the right-hand rule: The screw goes the direction my thumb points when my right hand closes. And if it's something left-handed like a bike pedal, it's easy to just use the other hand.
- leetcrew 6y agoI feel like this is the sort of thing that actually makes less sense when you develop explicit reasoning skills. as a child, "righty tighty, lefty loosey" made perfect sense. it never occurred to me that right/left could be relative to the bottom (from my perspective) of a jar lid. only when I started learning about math and coordinate systems did I think "right/left relative to what?".
- gliptic 6y agoI prefer "clockwise lockwise".
- tshaddox 6y agoThe phrase is talking about the top surface of the circle as the circle is facing you, since that’s normally where your vantage point is when you’re turning something with your hand. You have to think things through more carefully if the circle is oriented differently (imagine reaching through a broken window to turn a doorknob).
- lostlogin 6y ago
- snarfy 6y agoAs a lefty I visualized myself spinning a top - it's clockwise. That's because I'd use my right hand to spin a top. Do righties not use their left hand to spin a top?
- issamehh 6y agoI'm right handed yet I generally use my left hand for twist ties. I twist them counter-clockwise too. I never put any thought into it beyond wanting bread.