1272: Left-Handedness | Skeptical Sunday

1272: Left-Handedness | Skeptical Sunday

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Jordan Harbinger: [00:00:00] Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I am here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, writer and researcher Jessica Wynn. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life.

And those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers. On Sundays, though it's skeptical. Sunday, a rotating guest co-host and I will break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic.

Topics like astrology, recycling, chemtrails, GMOs, toothpaste, crystal healing and more. And if you're new to the show or you wanna tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter pack. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, junk science, crime, and cults and more.

That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit [00:01:00] Jordan harbinger.com/start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today on the show, it's possible you know someone who's left-handed, or maybe you're one of those people who insists on announcing it every time you pick up a pen.

Aside from the fact that lefties use their left hand to right play sports, do everyday tasks, you probably don't know much else about left-handed folks. As a lefty myself, I'm also curious what makes me a lefty in the first place. What gives us our handedness to get to the right or left side of things is writer and researcher.

Jessica Wynn. So Jess, I'm left-handed. I'm just gonna cut to the chase and assume that makes me superior to most other people, correct?

Jessica Wynn: I think so. But you are in good company.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay.

Jessica Wynn: Lady Gaga Obama. Jimi Hendrix, me. So you're on the left side of things

Jordan Harbinger: nice. But honestly, it can be kind of a drag scissors.

They don't work, they don't fit. Spiral notebooks aren't some kind of medieval torture device because I'm, and then I'm dragging ink across the page while getting a metal spring print on my wrist for six hours a day. You [00:02:00] know the drill.

Jessica Wynn: Oh yeah, it's the worst. I know. I spent my school days with a permanent ink stain on my left hand.

I've battled every school supply and utensil ever made, but we can't help it. And there is actual science behind all this.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay, so what is going on here? Why are some people left-handed? Is it genetics? Is it witchcraft? What's going on?

Jessica Wynn: Well, maybe a little of both. Handedness is this weird mix of genetics environment and random quirks in brain development.

As our understanding of genetics unfolds, we are learning more about what causes traits like handedness. What we do know today is that there's no single left-handed gene. It's more like a cocktail of small influences all mixing together.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay. But it's not that common. Most people are right-handed. It's not 50 50.

Jessica Wynn: Oh, no. Yeah. Lefties are rare. Only about 10% of the world's population is left-handed.

Jordan Harbinger: 10%. That's what is that Like [00:03:00] 800 plus million people holding scissors incorrectly.

Jessica Wynn: Right. And get this. Statistics also show men are slightly more likely to be left-handed than women. If you're a man, you have about a 12% chance women.

10%. Why that is, is still a complete unknown.

Jordan Harbinger: So even hand dominance is a gendered issue. Of course it is. I demand equality, Jessica.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean, it's not a huge difference, but statistically significant.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay, so really I'm, I'm a demographic unicorn, you know, left-handed Jewish and ridiculously good looking.

There's a lot of Venn diagram sort. Go on. Yes. Anyway, anyway, continue.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean, there's some other interesting patterns too. Studies show children born to mothers over 40 or more likely to be left-handed.

Jordan Harbinger: So mom decides that's a lot of power for mom. My mom had me not quite at 40, but I think she was 37, 38, so I don't know if that counts.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, that could have been a factor for sure.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, it could have been a factor. Do we know why this is the case? There's [00:04:00] a, I mean, again, that's a lot of power, sort of just for mom, but I don't know the baby's bacon in there. So in

Jessica Wynn: the, in the case of mom's age, there's a scientific theory that points to prenatal hormones and how the brain develops in the womb.

That influences which side of the brain becomes dominant, and that determines a bunch of stuff, including our handedness. So for whatever reason, people born to older moms, they just swing left.

Jordan Harbinger: I never thought about handedness starting in the womb. I thought it was a school thing. Okay. Interesting.

Jessica Wynn: Right?

Yeah. So the brain's asymmetry, meaning how the left and right hemispheres develop is set really early on. Most people's language centers end up on the left hemisphere, which controls the right hand. But for lefties, it's often reversed or it can be shared between both sides.

Jordan Harbinger: So our brains literally pick a side in utero.

A little fetal game of chance.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Yes. Yeah. It's all decided before we ever pick up a crayon. In the [00:05:00] 1990s, researchers identified a rare gene variant that they think plays the biggest role in the asymmetric left right brain split. It's called tub four B-T-U-B-B four B. And is present in every human, but in left-handed people, it's mutated.

Jordan Harbinger: TUBB four B sounds like a Star Wars droid.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, it is the droid they were looking for, right? Hmm. So tub four B is short for tubulin Beta four B, class four B.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay.

Jessica Wynn: It's a gene connected to microtubules tiny structures in your cells that act like scaffolding. So these microtubules shape how neurons grow and connect and keep our cells structured, organized, and help them divide and move.

Jordan Harbinger: Wow. So does being left-handed mean something is wrong with our microtubules or our TUBB four B?

Jessica Wynn: In a roundabout way, yes. Sort of. These microtubules are crucial and [00:06:00] associated with a lot of biological functions. Researchers have found that some mutations of the tub four B gene mess with microtubules and lead to hearing loss, vision problems, even infertility.

So microtubules influence the cilia. Those little hair-like organelles that move fluid around developing tissue and when the flow of that fluid is uneven. It creates the left right split in the brain,

Jordan Harbinger: and that determines whether I bat with my left or right hand. Wow.

Jessica Wynn: It's definitely a part of it. Yeah. So the job of these microscopic little guys is to determine how the brain organizes itself.

They're like our cells. Martha Stewart.

Jordan Harbinger: You just think that little tiny little thing. It just sets up my whole life. I guess it's the sort of the stoned version of Martha Stewart though.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Yeah. They're in an altered state for sure. Mm-hmm.

Jordan Harbinger: These

Jessica Wynn: rare Tub four B variants don't explain everything though.

Previous studies have found several genes that seem [00:07:00] to be tied to left-handedness. A breakthrough study published in Nature Communications Journal. Looked at over 350,000 people. 38,000 of them were lefties and over 300,000 righties. They found that this rare variant showed up about three times more often in left-handers.

Jordan Harbinger: So this gene doesn't cause left-handedness, it just shows up at the party every time left-handedness happens.

Jessica Wynn: Right. And at this point, it's correlation. It's not the cause. Mm-hmm. In fact, identical twins who share all the same DNA can still have different dominant hands. So twins are always particularly interesting case studies, and about 20% of twins are left-handed higher than in single births.

Jordan Harbinger: Crazy. So two people can share a womb, share a genome, look almost exactly the same, and they still can't sit next to each other at dinner without bumping elbows,

Jessica Wynn: right? Yeah, right. That's how we know the environment and random development patterns [00:08:00] matter just as much. Genes are only part of the story. So research shows that left-handedness comes down to tiny random differences in our position in the womb.

Jordan Harbinger: So what, how you chill in the womb is an indicator of your dominant hand for life. Like the fetus is just vibing, and then somehow that predicts if you'll be left-handed. That seems so random, but I guess that's nature.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, that's how it is. Even your position in the womb. So whether you were facing left or right.

Plays a role. It's like prenatal feng shui.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. Doctor, why is my baby left-handed? Well, his fetus roommate was hogging the right side of the uterus, so the rest of his life, he's gonna be unable to write with a pencil without making a mess. That's just, that's remarkable.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean, that's not far off.

Ultrasounds. Studies show fetus's start using consistent hand movements around 18 weeks. Those who suck their right thumb in the womb usually grow up right-handed. Those who go for the left thumb, left-handed, it sticks.

Jordan Harbinger: I didn't even realize fetus has sucked their thumb in the womb.

Jessica Wynn: Wow. [00:09:00] Yeah, they do. I know they do

Jordan Harbinger: that early too.

I thought there was more, I guess I thought there was more of a nature versus nurture balance that influenced things later on.

Jessica Wynn: Well, we just see it really early, but that's the big question. Nature and nurture are both going on in the womb too. So the brain starts picking sides before you even have thumbs.

Actually, scientists have been chasing the genetic side of this for decades.

Jordan Harbinger: I knew I was a genetic marvel. It's like a cosmic coin toss that decides how a microscopic current and the womb flows, and now I can't use a fricking vegetable peeler. Right? Thanks.

Jessica Wynn: I mean, genetics is definitely a part of it, but it's not the only thing pulling the strings.

It's many small genetic effects plus the prenatal environment. Then some good old fashioned randomness.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay, so a bunch of stuff is working together to nudge development in a certain direction, but is it hereditary? Like if two left-handed people have a baby, are they kind of guaranteed to have a left-handed kid or no?

Jessica Wynn: No, not at all. Children of left-handed parents are more likely to be left-handed, but the [00:10:00] probability is still pretty low, and most children still turn out right-handed. So heredity has a genetic component, so it does raise the odds, but it doesn't seal the deal. Like are your kids left-handed?

Jordan Harbinger: No, I think, well, so far they're both right-handed and I'm kind of the lone lefty island in my own house.

In fact, the only other left-handed person in my entire family is my mom's uncle.

Jessica Wynn: Wow. Not really something

Jordan Harbinger: that shows up elsewhere in the household.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, it's rare. I mean, do they ever try to copy the way you do things? Like a little left-handed mimic phase or anything?

Jordan Harbinger: Maybe, but I've never noticed. I have seen the reverse though.

In other people, Beatles fans are trying to mirror, is it Paul McCartney on the base? Total nightmare. He is left-handed and a lot of right. A lot of his bases are truly lefty builds and you can't, you can't just sort of flip that thing around and hope for the best. But that's more like adults being ignorant, not knowing how to play the guitar.

I, my kids, I don't think even notice that I'm left-handed, honestly.

Jessica Wynn: Right. Yeah. They probably don't have that concept yet. No. 'cause it is just a [00:11:00] natural dominant. Thing we do. Mm-hmm. And it would be a significant challenge to, as an adult, try and use a less dominant hand because handedness is decided long before anyone picks up an instrument.

Studies show that in the womb, fetuses start showing little quirks, like a head turning bias, meaning some turn to the right more often, which means they get more sensory feedback from that side. That feedback reinforces right hand use later on, and vice versa, left Turners end up left-handed.

Jordan Harbinger: That is remarkable that it's determined so early.

My, I can't really speak for the instrument thing. I tried to play, well, I should say my host father, when I lived in the former East Germany, he's a musician and he is like, you gotta learn the guitar, chicks love it. So he res strung a guitar to be left-handed, and I never touched it. And he goes. Thanks for never touching that guitar.

That took me like five hours to res stringing upside down. No, I don't know why it would take him so long. I've never re strung a guitar, but apparently it was like a huge pain and he was [00:12:00] like, thanks a lot man, for not even trying.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. 'cause there's balancing involved

Jordan Harbinger: and yeah, he like made it perfect, tuned the whole thing res strung the whole thing and you know, gave it basically a full tune up and I was like.

Nah.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, not interested. Could have

Jordan Harbinger: told me that before. I spent the afternoon doing that.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. That's hilarious. But another strong indicator is a fetus's preference for sucking. Its left or right thumb, like I said. So the preference is maintained throughout pregnancy. Handedness is thought to be decided before our thumbs even develop.

Jordan Harbinger: How can we know that

Jessica Wynn: it's using the ultrasound studies? Okay. Researchers can observe a fetus's earliest arm movements as early as 10 weeks to determine a preference. So a fetus will often make faster, more precise movements with its dominant arm, and by 18 weeks, the hand structure is developed and one side will reach toward their face, mouth and eyes more

Jordan Harbinger: crazy.

So we can spot a lefty before they're born by seeing which side they favor. I mean, I, I guess that makes [00:13:00] sense.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. I mean, it's still kind of a chicken and egg problem though, because we don't know if the fetus is positioned that way because it's predisposed to be left-handed. Or does the position create preference?

Jordan Harbinger: So the new reveal party trend should be like, congratulations. It's a lefty.

Jessica Wynn: Oh God. Yeah. Pink, blue, or south paw.

Jordan Harbinger: As long as you cause a massive forest fire, it's

fine.

Jessica Wynn: Oh God. Please do not invite me to a handedness reveal party. Yes. We'll not go. Plus it wouldn't be a hundred percent accurate because other factors do nudge, handedness, like hormone exposure, womb space, even your birth order.

They all play subtle roles.

Jordan Harbinger: I didn't know that. So is that because that all that stuff has to do with the hormone balance, birth order and all that stuff? 'cause I, I remember, I did a show a long time ago, and I'm gonna get this potentially wrong, but I think that the guy had said second born or third born men are more likely to be gay.

Apparently there's like a big trend, a correlation I [00:14:00] should say, with that. And I thought that was kind of amazing. And he is like, yeah, it's not a coincidence. The hormones in the womb change after a child is born. So it's like the first child is born and all the hormones change, but not right in the beginning.

And then when the second child is in there baking. It's like the hormone environment is already totally different than it was for the first child and that changes stuff.

Jessica Wynn: Absolutely. And like we said, when a woman ages too, so it depends her, her hormones change. So yeah, there's a lot of little factors that determine our chemistry.

Jordan Harbinger: So we live in interesting womb life, but once I'm born, I pop out into the real world. And then what can my handedness change after that?

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, it's believed to some extent they can. So after birth genetics team up with environment, cultural factors start to matter and kids imitate what they see, their parents, teachers and siblings, what they're all doing.

Jordan Harbinger: So like if my dad's a write and keeps handing me spoons from that side, boom, I can turn into a writey for life or what?

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean, it's possible. The [00:15:00] spinal cord itself shows left right differences early on, and that indicates what babies see and imitate. That's how it all gets reinforced. So for centuries, society has been biased towards right handedness, and that can matter for some people.

Some schools force kids to switch to writing with their right hand, even if they favor the left naturally.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. I've actually heard these stories. Nuns smacking people with rulers yelling, you, you know, use, use a right hand, you're gonna anger God or something.

Jessica Wynn: I mean, that was literally my experience.

Jordan Harbinger: Wow.

Jessica Wynn: Second grade Sister Collins. I look back and really think she feared me and thought I was some kind of devil's intern.

Jordan Harbinger: Mm.

Jessica Wynn: I had red hair. I was left-handed. She, she made me stay after school to practice writing with my right hand, and the results looked like crooked outta control, penmanship, like a ransom note or something.

It wasn't long after that I was politely asked to switch to a public [00:16:00] school because I was so devilish, I guess.

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Now back to skeptical Sunday. Here's what I never understood about religious schools, by the way, born rotten. No surprise you would think they get a, a bad kid or even a not bad kid that has red hair and they're like, challenge accepted, right? Like, isn't the whole [00:19:00] idea, Hey, we're gonna make you into a good person.

They seem to be like, eh, this is a little bit too much work. Go to public school with the rest of the schmos.

Jessica Wynn: I know they just, lots of hatred in the,

Jordan Harbinger: yeah, there. What's that? There's no hatred, like Catholic love. I think I read that on Reddit. Something like that. Sorry. Don't hate me. Don't at me. I'm probably getting that wrong.

Anyway. Continue.

Jessica Wynn: But Yeah. But left-handed individuals were often viewed with suspicion. They were accused of witchcraft and even punished in some cases. There's a myth that left-handed writing was banned by Pope Innocent Thei in the 16 hundreds, but I couldn't find any proof of that. What is documented is that writing with the left hand was considered a direct affront to divine order.

Further cementing the notion that the right hand was God's hand. And the proper way to perform holy and virtuous acts.

Jordan Harbinger: By the way, I, I want to be clear. I'm not throwing shade on Catholics. I don't know anything about it. Just something I, I heard, because Catholics, I guess, are really strict in the upbringing [00:20:00] in the schools, not trying to get hate mail for any of this.

It's not something that I necessarily believe. It's just something I keep hearing. So the control of the Catholic church, by the way, speaking of hate mail, the control of the Catholic church, it really does cross a lot of boundaries. No one ever, no one ever tried to force me to write with my right hand.

But when I lived in the former East Germany, I remember my friend Nancy, she saw me writing with my left hand, and she was like, whoa, you're left-handed. I've never seen that before. And I was like, what are you ta, what are you talking about? That doesn't make any sense. How have you, how is that even possible?

And she's like, oh, well we weren't allowed to be left-handed. I'm like, how? What? Are you TA allowed to be left-handed? You just are, or you aren't. You can't not be allowed to be. That doesn't make any sense. Of course, I had no idea. She goes, no, if you tried to write with your left hand. They wouldn't let you do it.

I'm like, what happens if you just do it? She's like, yeah, you weren't allowed to do it. They didn't let you, you do punished. And I was like, so how does that make any sense? She's like, I'm pretty sure that I was born left-handed. And they, it took a long time for me to become right-handed. And I was like, you should go back.

You live in a free country now. There's no more you [00:21:00] knowI that's gonna report on you for writing with your left hand. She's like, oh, I couldn't do it now. It's too late. You know? She was probably 16, 17 years old at that point. And it's kind of a bummer 'cause I'm like, man, they beat your nature out of you by making you stay after school and write, you know, using your right hand.

Jessica Wynn: That's really strange that everybody wanted things in a uniform fashion. You know, I mean, it traces back to all these older taboos. Cultural conditioning is huge and that can influence our hand dominance. In some societies and cultures, using your left hand for daily tasks, especially eating is still considered rude or unclean.

Jordan Harbinger: Yes. Oh my gosh. Oh, by the way, in the former East Germany, that whole right hand, left hand thing that had nothing to do with religion, religion was, I won't say outlawed, but very, very, very discouraged. So it had nothing to do with being Christian or Catholic or religious in any way. It had nothing to do with that.

It was just conformity. They love conformity and Right, and communism. You know, they don't want somebody who does things [00:22:00] differently because, well, yeah. They don't want anybody to be different something, something everybody's equal. Sure. So the not using your left hand to eat that has to do with using the left hand traditionally in some societies, cultures, whatever, for toilet business historically.

Is that correct?

Jessica Wynn: That's right. There was a time before toilet paper. And hand sanitizer. And the left hand was the bathroom hand.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah.

Jessica Wynn: So hygiene, wiping, all that glamorous stuff was the left hand's duties.

Jordan Harbinger: That is a tough break for us lefties, and I hate that I'm doing this, but again, when I lived in the former East Germany, there was a gal named Olga and she had done her exchange year in Indonesia.

And I was like, Indonesia, what's that like? And she's like, I loved it. The only thing I didn't like was that everybody uses their hand in the bathroom. And I'm like, what are you talking about? This is my introduction to this. And I was like, so you wiped your butt with your hand? She's like, no, I was special.

I had toilet paper. And I'm like, but what happens if you just go somewhere and you have to go to the bathroom? There's no toilet paper in there. She's like, no, no, no. I carried toilet paper with me everywhere for the entire [00:23:00] year. And because otherwise, what if you're like out hanging and you're like, oh, I kinda have to go to the bathroom.

And you go to the bathroom? Number one, right? If you're a gal, you need to wipe and it's just like there's no paper in there.

Jessica Wynn: And why wouldn't that catch on

Jordan Harbinger: again? I don't want a bunch of hate mail, but it's like there was a time before toilet paper. Yeah, but it's been around for like a hundred years.

Maybe we wanna reform our cult. Nah, we'll just keep wiping our butts with our hands. Sorry, I don't mean to be all ethnocentric or whatever, but. Bruh.

Jessica Wynn: Even ancient Rome had like the sponge on a stick, you know?

Jordan Harbinger: Exactly, yes. Have you not seen the seashells or whatever it was in, uh, what is that movie with Sliced Stallone and Sandra Bullock?

Jessica Wynn: Oh God. I forget what it's called. I know what you're talking about.

Jordan Harbinger: Is that Demolition man?

Jessica Wynn: Demolition man, that's

Jordan Harbinger: it. Yeah. So like, and they're like, uh, he's like, I have to go to the bathroom, and she hands him like some seashells Or was that when they were gonna bang? I can't, I can Annie. Anyways, please rescue me.

Tell me more about wiping your butt with a left hand and get me off this topic.

Jessica Wynn: I will say it is why everyone [00:24:00] shakes hands with their right hand. That and shaking with the right hand is, you know, it's an old school peace signal.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. It's probably pretty aggressive to offer your poop hand as a greeting.

Like, hello. Yes.

Jessica Wynn: And the right hand was the weapon hand. So offering it meant look, you know, no dagger. And the up and down shake part is basically a medieval TSA check to make sure nothing pops outta your sleeve.

Jordan Harbinger: Weapons on the right. Hygiene on the left.

Jessica Wynn: Oh God. Yeah, definitely. I mean, in parts of India and the Middle East, it's still considered rude to eat or handle food with your left hand.

'cause it's associated with hygienic duties.

Jordan Harbinger: So if you're traveling and you're a lefty, maybe don't reach for the non without thinking.

Jessica Wynn: Right. If you travel internationally, you'll definitely want to be mindful of what hands you're using. For sure.

Jordan Harbinger: So we're not just born this way, we're trained this way.

Jessica Wynn: It seems to be, at least for some people, I mean, my experience has left me ambidextrous.

Admittedly, I don't write with pen and [00:25:00] paper as much anymore, but before phones and laptops, I'd switch hands while writing without even noticing. But beneath all of this, the brain's wiring drives. A lot of it Left-handed people are shown to have a larger corpus callosum.

Jordan Harbinger: Why does that sound like a penis part?

Is that a left hand? Is that a left hand in your pocket or No, but what? What is that? What is that thing?

Jessica Wynn: The bridge that connects the two hemispheres of our brain? So lefties often have a larger one, which means faster communication between both sides.

Jordan Harbinger: I always knew lefties were hung in the brain, so our brains are basically the high speed wifi of the brain world.

Nice.

Jessica Wynn: Sure, sure. Yeah. I mean that inner hemispheric connection helps with multitasking and creative problem solving.

Jordan Harbinger: So lefties are better. Multitaskers, is that the case?

Jessica Wynn: Lefties seem to have an advantage in multitasking because. You process information more quickly. This gives lefties an advantage in [00:26:00] activities like video games or sports.

And according to research, lefties can oftentimes be better multitaskers because they have that larger corpus callosum. Or part of the brain that facilitates communication between the two hemispheres.

Jordan Harbinger: So multitasking is just the ability to use both sides of the brain simultaneously.

Jessica Wynn: That's one way to put it.

Sure. It's more of a fast like ping pong thing going on. That's also why more left-handed people are found in creative fields.

Jordan Harbinger: So creative lefty, that thing is not, that's not just a stereotype.

Jessica Wynn: There's some truth to it. Lefties tend to rely a bit more on the right hemisphere, which is the one linked to creativity, imagination, and spatial skills.

Again, not a guarantee, but it's more likely. There are some un creative lefties out there too, but there are lots of claims that left-handedness means creativity, a high IQ and artistic talent.

Jordan Harbinger: I always figured my lefty brain gave me a unique edge somehow, but [00:27:00] usually the everyday annoyances, watch that out.

Jessica Wynn: Many left-handers do have more creative talents since lefties more often. Utilize the right side of the brain. Which, you know, it's just touted as the more artistic side, and that's according to the National Library of Medicine.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay, so our bigger brain bridge lets us communicate between both sides of our brain at once, but it's a team effort, man, DNA, hormones, superstitions, I can only speak from my experience, but lefties are.

I've heard more intelligent too, right? People always say that, but it kind of sounds like one of those, pat yourself on the back. Urban legends and not really science,

Jessica Wynn: and you're better at the humble brag apparently.

Jordan Harbinger: Oh, yes. Masters. Masters of Humility,

Jessica Wynn: Left-Handedness has been linked to higher IQ scores in several studies.

With more left-handers scoring over one 40 than right-handers.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. Thank you again. I've been waiting for this validation.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, well you're welcome. But settle down Lefties aren't automatically geniuses.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay, fine. But again, I have been told that [00:28:00] there's a difference in how lefties process languages and stuff, for example, are we wired differently for that as well.

Jessica Wynn: Some studies suggest, yes, left-handers process language using both hemispheres of the brain. Right handers mostly stick to just the left hemisphere.

Jordan Harbinger: I see. Okay. So yeah, losers got it.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Well, it just means lefties have more inner hemispheric communication, meaning more crosstalk between the two sides of the brain, but it.

Does come with a higher rate of dyslexia, especially among mixed handers. You know, the people who switch hands a lot,

Jordan Harbinger: Uhhuh,

Jessica Wynn: anecdotally, I've never experienced dyslexia, but a lot of lefties do.

Jordan Harbinger: Interesting. But that's only because you, the nuns made you learn how to do that, so you switch hands. But maybe you wouldn't have if you weren't getting beat with a ruler,

Jessica Wynn: right?

I don't think so. And I mean, I can write, I can bat. Play pool with both hands.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay. Maybe then,

Jessica Wynn: yeah, but eating with my right hand is really uncomfortable. I can't bowl or [00:29:00] throw a dart or throw a ball with my right hand though.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, I don't know. I'd have to try those. I'm at the point where I'd have to try many of those things to even know, because I can do weird stuff with both hands that people don't expect.

Then it's like, here's a fork. And I'm like, I can't. How do, how does it work? Right? So I really have to try everything. I doubt I could play pool with both hands. There's no way I could bat with both hands. I probably do golf or something left. I right, left, throw left. But I don't know if I could bowl or throw a, I don't think I'd throw a dart or a ball.

Right-handed either. So it's, I don't know if I'm ambidextrous then, because it's just such a crapshoot at at what I'm gonna be able to do with either hand.

Jessica Wynn: And it's weird, right? I mean, you don't even think about it. No, it's just this is what I pick something up with. Right. And even how you draw can reflect which hand your brain prefers.

Like left-handers often sketch people facing the right side of the page, probably because of how the hand moves across the paper. And it's the opposite for righties. And this is true for drawings by adults [00:30:00] and children,

Jordan Harbinger: art imitating, ergonomics. I would never notice that. But now I'm gonna have to go back and look at my sketchbook, which doesn't exist because I can't draw at all.

But I also, you know, I also shoot weapons right-handed, but that's also kind of like more to do with my eyes maybe than my hands,

Jessica Wynn: right?

Jordan Harbinger: Because if I put the firearm in my left hand. I close one eye, stuff moves, so that doesn't really work. Anyway, I got missed with the drawing gene. So again, you use both hands because you're weird.

Catholic school nuns who were abusive beat you into it, but can people actually adapt to a different hand? It seems like you probably could if you had to.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean, to a degree. I mean, the brain is plastic so you can train it, but most people still have a dominant side. Cultures. You know, like we were talking about East Germany, they try to control what hand you write and eat with, but it can't control every movement you make in the world.

Evolutionary theories suggest left-handedness might have offered an advantage in combat. 'cause opponents [00:31:00] weren't prepared to defend themselves from that angle.

Jordan Harbinger: So it's not a sucker punch, it's just an evolutionary advantage. Like in baseball, I've heard lefty pitchers have a huge advantage somehow, and it has to do with the term South paw, right?

Jessica Wynn: I mean, everyone thinks that. I thought that the idea that it's because the left-handed pitcher's arm is on the south side of the diamond. But the term southpaw showed up in 1813 in a publication called Tickler.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay.

Jessica Wynn: Decades before baseball existed,

Jordan Harbinger: I mean, anything called tickler now is pornographic.

Jessica Wynn: They were more innocent about it back then.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, 200 years ago, I guess. We'll let it slide. So, okay, so this is not a baseball term, I guess. I always assumed it was a baseball term.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, me too. But it actually originated from boxing. So historically, north and right were associated with heaven and angels, south and left.

That's the devil's territory. So paw meant hand and south was linked to [00:32:00] sinister, which is Latin for left. So a sinister punch was described with the slang south paw. It's just another linguistic reminder that lefties were literally seen as evil.

Jordan Harbinger: I mean, devil Paw would be cooler. I think

Jessica Wynn: that'd be, that'd be so much cooler.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah.

Jessica Wynn: But the word was seen in a few political cartoons as well in the 18 hundreds describing like debate, beatdowns. But then baseball came along in the 1840s,

Jordan Harbinger: so boxing created it, baseball popularized it, and now nobody knows where it came from,

Jessica Wynn: right? Yeah. I mean, baseball changed the meaning a bit. So fields were best designed with home plate facing east, so batters wouldn't stare into the sun.

That meant a left-handed pitchers throwing arm ended up on the south side of his body. So baseball just borrowed the term and changed its origin story.

Jordan Harbinger: That makes sense. 'cause I feel like I've chat GTD this or Gemini or whatever this ages ago. Yeah. And it told me it was a baseball term or somebody told me it was.

And that was the end of that. So, [00:33:00] all right. Baseball became so big. Everyone just associates South Paw with a left-handed pitcher. That makes sense.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Right. And in fact, left-handed athletes dominate sports where you face an opponent. So sports like boxing, baseball, tennis and fencing. You know, lefties win more fights and boxing matches and research has shown that left-handed boxers win more because they confuse opponents with their stance.

Jordan Harbinger: So left-handed athletes don't have a disadvantage. It's actually an advantage.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. A lot of times it's the advantage. Yeah.

Jordan Harbinger: I guess it does seem like more and more major league baseball players bat left-handed these days, or is that just my imagination?

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean, I think a lot more tend to bat. Left and right, and that has to do with them trying to get the advantage on the picture, whether the picture's right or left-handed.

Especially a pitcher because they can generally throw curve balls and sliders and other trickier pitches that make it harder for those at bat to hit successfully.

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All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable on the website at Jordan harbinger.com/deals. Now for the rest of skeptical Sunday. You know I realized when I trained with a boxing coach. I could switch my stances and I kept doing it thinking, oh darn, I keep switching.

And he's like, no, no, no, you gotta keep doing that. 'cause if you can box with both stances, that's gonna be incredible 'cause most people can't do that. And he is like, but dude, if you do that in like the middle of a fight, he's like, your tired opponent is gonna get wrecked. Of course the problem was I was terrible and never made it past the [00:36:00] first couple of rounds because it's like, you know, this is really hard and tiring.

And the guy who can jump rope for half an hour has a little bit of an edge on me. And also getting punched in the face kind of sucks. This isn't for me. I suppose it makes it harder for a right hand. Pitch to throw to a lefty batter. Yeah.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. I mean, and left-Handers are overrepresented in sports, like left-handed water.

Polo players are rare, but they offer a competitive advantage because they're able to face both the goal and be responsive to teammates. If you and water polo's not that popular, but it is an interesting formation, how they can take advantage over their right-handed. It's similar to tennis. A left-handed tennis player has an advantage over their right-hand counterparts because playing tennis as a lefty.

It forces the opponent to respond to different angles and spins and serving positions.

Jordan Harbinger: That makes sense. I guess I should be out there hustling all the righties.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, you might be able to. I mean, left-handed pool players have an advantage [00:37:00] because they have better angles for certain shots they can often shoot righty as well from the simple fact of just adapting to a right-handed world and fencing gets interesting when a lefty is an opponent.

It just confuses everything a right-handed person trained for. There's even a classic scene about it in, uh, that movie, the Princess Bride.

Jordan Harbinger: Right. Because they're throwing from an angle nobody expects. It's like the Jedi mind trick of athletics.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, for sure. And this is in athletics, but another interesting fact is that.

Astronauts are more likely to be left-handed.

Jordan Harbinger: So you're telling me lefties are not only better athletes, we're also literally leaving the planet,

Jessica Wynn: right? Yeah. About 60% of astronauts are left-handed. Wow. Which is a rate much higher than the general population.

Jordan Harbinger: That's wild. Do we have any reason why that is?

Jessica Wynn: I mean, there's nothing solid, but it does point back to how those Celia are formed in the womb. Since they influence our hearing and vision, that seems to be a [00:38:00] factor for things like astronauts, pilots, even underwater divers.

Jordan Harbinger: Why would it affect divers?

Jessica Wynn: This is weird and not sure what it means evolutionarily, but studies overwhelmingly show that left-handed people adjust more easily to seeing underwater and have far better vision below the surface than righties.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay? Lefties are better athletes, astronauts, and mermaids. This is getting unfair. I guess I feel better about all those scissor and pencil on my hand incidents throughout the years now.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean it's an everything. It's not just with our hands. We have dominant feet. You know, consider skateboarders and surfers who ride with what's called goofy footed.

Even animals show handedness, cats, dogs, horses, chimps. Male cats are more likely to be left pawed.

Jordan Harbinger: Left pawed. So the animal kingdom's got lefties and righties. I had no idea.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, many animals are handed or pawed. So handedness in animals is a widespread phenomenon, not an [00:39:00] exception, and can provide insights into evolution and brain development.

So studies on cats and dogs show a significant portion of each species has a dominant paw. So the ratio of left to right pod individuals can vary, but male cats are more likely to be left pod when completing tasks like getting food from the bowl or things like that. Other mammals like horses, squirrels, and chimpanzees also show limb preferences for tasks like cantering stripping acorns or using tools.

Jordan Harbinger: I never considered what hand or paw my pets were. So even my cat is in on this. I knew it. Yeah. It's been knocking over cups of his left paw this whole time for science. Why? Why is that? I wonder.

Jessica Wynn: I mean, it's all tied to brain lateralization where different functions are concentrated and. One of the two hemispheres of the brain, so we see it in every species.

For example, like young chicks tend to peck grain on one side. Tortoises [00:40:00] consistently turn to one side to write themselves when flipped over. In the animal kingdom, there's an evolutionary advantage to favoring the left. Even if you don't have hands, like snails with left coiling shells have an advantage against predators who have adapted to crack more common right coiling shells.

Isn't that crazy?

Jordan Harbinger: Remarkable. Yeah, that is crazy. Wow. Don't tell me fish are left and right, F or whatever.

Jessica Wynn: Actually, they seem to be the blue whales perform specific movements like barrel rolls to feed. With a preferred side showing a consistent handedness or fend, whatever you wanna call it, in their behavior.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah.

Jessica Wynn: The octopus, which by the way is my least favorite animal on the planet, has eight equally nimble arms, but they show a preference for using one tentacle to inspect or handle objects. So they favor a tentacle. It's kind of their dominant arm.

Jordan Harbinger: That is cool. So the animal kingdom's basically full of lefties.

[00:41:00] Righties and the terrifying octopus. Love a good octopus. But what? What's your beef there? I don't understand.

Jessica Wynn: I mean, this is off topic. It's just my lifelong phobia.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay.

Jessica Wynn: I can't. Even watch the Little Mermaid Jordan. Oh, get outta here. It's not just me. It's called chap phobia, and it sucks because I surf all the time.

I've come face to face with a giant one once, which still gives me nightmares.

Jordan Harbinger: What

Jessica Wynn: I am not suggesting, this is rational, but I mean even a photo will make me panic and literally talking about it. Right now, my hands are. Clammy.

Jordan Harbinger: Wow, that's crazy. So I take it You have not watched my octopus teacher on Netflix?

Jessica Wynn: No. No.

Jordan Harbinger: Face your fears. That is crazy. I, I never heard of this.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. It's not something I'm proud of, but,

Jordan Harbinger: okay,

Jessica Wynn: let's move on.

Jordan Harbinger: All right, fine.

Jessica Wynn: But reptiles and birds also show favoritism to one side and any species from kangaroos to lizards. You know, we learn a lot about handedness from animals, and handedness is often task specific.

[00:42:00] So it can be influenced by whatever task is at hand. For instance, you know, some great apes don't show hand preference for social tasks, but exhibit it for tool use. I have a friend who can only snap with her left hand, like, why? Why is that? Nobody knows. Some people don't always golf or bowl or shoot a gun, like we said, to match the hand.

They write with. It goes back to what you said about the eyes, because it's not just handedness. We have dominant eyes, feet, sides. We chew on which nostril we're, we're breathing out of. And they don't always favor the same side, right? It's not random chaos. It's evolution's way of saying, Hey, let's specialize here.

Jordan Harbinger: So being a lefty isn't weird. It's just nature having a good time. Just thinking about all these physical expressions, is it doing anything we can't see? Like, you know, are there health issues that affect lefties? You know, like when we did the redheads thing, it was like, oh, skin cancer and temperature and all this stuff.

It's like, oh my gosh, your hair color can affect all that. Is there anything also linked to TUBB four B [00:43:00] that's like, oh, and also you're gonna, you know, your liver's bigger or something?

Jessica Wynn: I dunno. Yeah, I mean, we think so. I mean there's really definitely some things in lefty fine print. It's very early on in in the research.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay.

Jessica Wynn: But left-handed people tend to hit puberty later than their peers. There was a study that showed left-handed boys reached puberty about a year later than their right-handed peers. More studies are needed on this, though

Jordan Harbinger: I was a bit of a late bloomer. Now I have a medical excuse. I suppose

Jessica Wynn: it's 'cause you're left-handed.

Jordan Harbinger: There you go.

Jessica Wynn: There's another weird biological fact. And this isn't just a left-handed phenomenon. It's true for both right and left-handed people, whichever is your dominant hand. Your nails grow faster on that hand.

Jordan Harbinger: Really? How weird is that? I've never noticed that. But now I'm definitely gonna be comparing my pinky nails.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I know. I've been checking it out since I read that,

Jordan Harbinger: huh.

Jessica Wynn: And there's less fun facts too. I mean, according to a few studies, left-Handers have a higher chance of developing immune disorders and conditions such [00:44:00] as allergies. This isn't to say every left-handed person suffers from bad allergies, but if you're a lefty and tend to get a runny nose or itchy eyes, then this may be connected to those modified microtubules.

It's currently being researched

Jordan Harbinger: a small price to pay for all the advantages that we seem to have. I guess I don't know. Not a big deal. I'll take a runny nose. No problem. I'm gonna space.

Jessica Wynn: Another inexplicable health effect is that left-handed people are more likely to drink more often.

Jordan Harbinger: Ooh.

Jessica Wynn: So the research on this is really limited, but there have been some studies showing a significant correlation between left-handers and an increase in alcohol consumption.

This isn't to say that left-handers will become full-blown alcoholics, but on average they do tend to drink more.

Jordan Harbinger: I mean, in my twenties, that was definitely true slash early thirties. Yikes. So evolution made us better athletes and more fun at parties. Great.

Jessica Wynn: Maybe a lot of this is correlation, though, not causation.

But another thing seen in [00:45:00] higher rates in lefties is that they report more vivid dreams.

Jordan Harbinger: Of course, we do. We're so busy dreaming about being left-handed astronauts with 140 IQs in perfect underwater vision.

Jessica Wynn: I don't know, but it seems, from what I've read, it's probably because their brains won't stop multitasking in both hemispheres.

Jordan Harbinger: Mm.

Jessica Wynn: But studies indicate left-handed individuals are better able to recall having vivid dreams at night. And on the flip side, left-handed people are more prone to insomnia. So if you have difficulty sleeping and are left-handed, then that could be a reason why.

Jordan Harbinger: Huh? Okay. So all of these little traits seem to be connected to this specific genetic coating, and at the end of the day, does any of it really matter

Jessica Wynn: mean?

It definitely does. You know, handedness is a window into how the brain organizes itself before we even take our first breath. It's a mix of genetics environment and these little dashes of randomness.

Jordan Harbinger: So some people are born ready to strum a guitar upside down and the rest of us are just trying not to smudge [00:46:00] the ink.

I guess it depends on few other factors.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, so many things, and that's just one way to sum up 50 years of neuroscience, I guess. It is interesting to observe the high rates of lefties in the arts, though, you know Oprah, lady Gaga, Hugh Jackman, bill Gates, Julius Child, Gordon Ramsey, da Vinci. It's a really long list and the rates are higher than in the general public.

Jordan Harbinger: So again, it's not the Jews running Hollywood, it's the lefties or. Is it all of us left-handed Jews?

So lefties, run, daytime tv, pop, music tech and dinner. Great. What's next? The White House, actually, I'm curious about that. Are there any lefty presidents?

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Already happened. 20% of US presidents have been left-handed. Wow. Including Obama and Clinton. A high percentage of politicians through the ages have been lefties much higher than the general population.

Julius Caesar and Napoleon were left-handed.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:47:00] Bill Clinton, being a lefty, explains why the writing on my Eagle Scout award was so they, you get a letter from the president and the writing on there is, it's pretty messy. There's probably another Bill Clinton joke in there I could have chosen, but yes, let's.

Let's, uh, let's move on. Let's let that one just slide on by. So conquerors, presidents and us. Okay. Lefties. We get it. We're histor. We're cool on a historical level. Amazing.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean, that tracks Tina Fey, Cardi B, Chuck Norris, all lefties. Of

Jordan Harbinger: course, the roundhouse kick comes from the left side. They never see it coming.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. And we can celebrate this rare trait every. August 13th, which is left-handed day.

Jordan Harbinger: That's a thing. Okay.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Whomever sets these kind of things suggests everyone try using their left hand as much as possible that day

Jordan Harbinger: I'm on it

Jessica Wynn: and it's fun to see how long you can try and use your less dominant hand for things.

Because it's such second nature, it's just, you forget, you know, it's just who we are.

Jordan Harbinger: I like that. You know, just try eating with your less dominant hand for one day listeners and [00:48:00] report back. I, I think eating is one of the hardest things to do with your non-dominant hand aside from writing.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I think so too.

But it just comes down as a chance of so many different variables. We think that most instances of left-handedness occur simply due to random variation during development of the embryonic brain. Specific genetic or environmental influences, but we will understand it more and more as we continue to decode our genes.

You know, there's just no doubt handedness is complex. It's not in just inherited, it's part genetics, part environment, part chaos. You know, it's a small club and what it means, evolutionarily, we're still figuring out.

Jordan Harbinger: So being a lefty just reminds us how wonderfully weird the human brain is. And if you're left-handed and listening, congrats, this episode was made for you.

The rest of you, everything else on the planet was designed for you. So I don't want any complaining. Thanks Jess for getting us on the right side of being left. Thank you all for listening. Topic [00:49:00] suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to me, jordan@jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show.

All on the website at Jordan harbinger.com/deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Jessica can be found on her sub stacks between the lines and where Shadows linger, and we'll link to those in the show notes as well. This show is created in association with PodcastOne.

My team is Jen Harbinger, Jase Sanderson, Tadas Sidlauskas, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and yes, I might be a lawyer, but I'm certainly not your lawyer. Also, we try to get these as right as we can. Not everything is gospel, even if it's fact checked. So consult a professional before applying anything you hear on the show, especially if it's about your health and wellbeing.

Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next.[00:50:00]

What if we're not just close to building matrix level simulations, we may already be inside one. You're about to hear a preview of our episode with Rizwan Virk on clues we're living in a rendered world.

JHS Trailer: The simulation hypothesis is basically the idea that what we think of is the physical world. You know, like this table, this chair, that all the physical reality is actually part of a virtual world.

The simulation hypothesis, the subtitle is. And MIT computer scientist shows why ai, quantum physics and eastern mystics agree. We're in a video game. There have been a number of physicists who aren't looking at the world as information now, so there's a whole branch of physics called digital physics, and instead of looking at things like conservation of energy and conservation of momentum, you're looking at conservation of information.

Does information get created or get destroyed? And some have even said that the world itself is basically a quantum computer, if you think about it. And so that would be whatever computational substrate is being used to run the simulation would have to be a lot more advanced than what we think of as computers today.

I use [00:51:00] the metaphor of video games that the world is the type of massively multiplayer online video game. 'cause that's sort of my background was in building video games in Silicon Valley. Now there's a lot of different. Flavors of simulation theory when you kind of delve deep into it. And probably the most popular expression of that in the media has been the film, the Matrix.

'cause you know, Neo thought he was in a real physical world, but turns out he was actually in a virtual world. But now AI is moving so fast that I think will get to that point much more quickly, and certainly within the next 50 years, a hundred years at the max.

Jordan Harbinger: For the full conversation that will make you question every assumption you've ever held.

Check out episode 1239 of The Jordan Harbinger Show with Rizwan Virk.