Hands Doing Circles

[Speakpigeon]

Stand or sit to be confortable. Keep both your hands still and facing your chest, aligned with each other, fingertips touching. Then take the time to think about how you could possibly move each hand independently in a circle so that the two circles keep parallel to each other, like the top and bottom edges of a flat cylinder. Once you feel ready to make your move, do it and observe for at least ten seconds what you are actually doing. Now stop and please describe here what it is your hands did exactly.

The more people the better.

And don't copy each other!
EB

 

[Malintent]

I don't understand the instructions...

"facing your chest, aligned with each other, fingertips touching"

I can't physically "align" my hands, facing the same direction.. unless I had two left hands, so to speak. Also impossible is "touch fingertips" while also being on two separate plains, "like the top and bottom of a cylinder". I don't know what a "flat cylinder" even is... other than a rectangle... like a "flat sphere" is a circle.

Can you share a picture of the starting position?

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

I don't get it.

 

[Malintent]

I am reminded of these instructions on how to correctly lift...

[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e4SBxgqBEY[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Speakpigeon]

I don't understand the instructions...

"facing your chest, aligned with each other, fingertips touching"

I can't physically "align" my hands, facing the same direction.. unless I had two left hands, so to speak. Also impossible is "touch fingertips" while also being on two separate plains, "like the top and bottom of a cylinder".
Can you share a picture of the starting position?

'Aligned' doesn't mean 'in the same direction', it means 'on the same line'. If you further need the fingers to touch you have to have your hands in opposite directions.

I don't know what a "flat cylinder" even is... other than a rectangle... like a "flat sphere" is a circle.

First, a flat cylinder is a cylinder, not a rectangle (like a flat tire is a tire or a flat Earth is an Earth and a circle not a flat sphere).

So, think of a cylinder, any cylinder. Now, flatten it so as to keep it a cylinder, i.e. by getting the two opposite, disk-like, faces closer together, without making the cylinder disappear. It's a flat cylinder.
EB

 

[Malintent]

I have no idea what you are trying to describe... but if you are trying to describe one of the many "left hand - right hand independence" tricks, such as rubbing your belly while tapping your head, or tracing two circles in opposite directions, then what it looks like for most people is two hands starting to do what you tell them, and then one of the hands quickly reversing or otherwise copying what the other hand is doing.
The "trick" to any of these challenges is to not think of drawing a circle, or of tapping your head... break the movements down into smaller components and learn the moves in steps, like learning a dance move.

In the case of two opposite circles with the hands... a good trick is to visualize a single circle with your hands starting on the same point at the top or bottom of the circle, and then trace the circle in opposite directions to a point on the opposite side of the circle. Then continue around to the starting point. you are now tracing 180 degree arcs instead of a full circle, and it is twice as easy.

 

[fromderinside]

Oh shit. I didn't wear my waders and now my feet are all wet. Always nice for explanations to be complete and in sync with the steps and conditions involved.

 

[Speakpigeon]

I have no idea what you are trying to describe... but if you are trying to describe one of the many "left hand - right hand independence" tricks, such as rubbing your belly while tapping your head, or tracing two circles in opposite directions, then what it looks like for most people is two hands starting to do what you tell them, and then one of the hands quickly reversing or otherwise copying what the other hand is doing.
The "trick" to any of these challenges is to not think of drawing a circle, or of tapping your head... break the movements down into smaller components and learn the moves in steps, like learning a dance move.

In the case of two opposite circles with the hands... a good trick is to visualize a single circle with your hands starting on the same point at the top or bottom of the circle, and then trace the circle in opposite directions to a point on the opposite side of the circle. Then continue around to the starting point. you are now tracing 180 degree arcs instead of a full circle, and it is twice as easy.

Tracing two circles is exactly what I was describing. There's a story on an experiment where engineers were shown a description of a camera in entirely functional terms and apparently none of them were able to tell that it was all about the concept of camera.

And my point is why is it so difficult for most people to trace circles in opposite directions? I've asked people I met over the years, familly, friends, colleagues, even Japanese and German professional acquaintances, and I've never met anyone who could do it at all, let alone straight away. Any explanation?
EB

 

[Malintent]

Yes. Babies have truly independent motor control... notice how they flail about.. arms and legs all moving in different directions at the same time... this is how they learn how to walk and perform other highly coordinated tasks that they eventually will need to get down to an unconscious act.. it's not like anyone has time to focus on "left, shift weight, right, shift weight..." while trying to cross a room.

that motor skill 'autopilot' we develop comes at the cost of independent fluidity of motion. It just takes way too much brain power to maintain that ability to learn new 'moves'. Same concept with language too... babies are capable of (and do) produce every sound that is used in any spoken language around the world. By a certain point in their development, they 'forget' how to make the sounds that they have not used for the language their parents exposed them to.

So, basically you are too old to learn how to make those types of opposing moves, because since you stopped being a baby you los that fluidity of independent motion... you already learned all of the coordinated moves you needed to survive as a child.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Yes. Babies have truly independent motor control... notice how they flail about.. arms and legs all moving in different directions at the same time... this is how they learn how to walk and perform other highly coordinated tasks that they eventually will need to get down to an unconscious act.. it's not like anyone has time to focus on "left, shift weight, right, shift weight..." while trying to cross a room.

that motor skill 'autopilot' we develop comes at the cost of independent fluidity of motion. It just takes way too much brain power to maintain that ability to learn new 'moves'. Same concept with language too... babies are capable of (and do) produce every sound that is used in any spoken language around the world. By a certain point in their development, they 'forget' how to make the sounds that they have not used for the language their parents exposed them to.

So, basically you are too old to learn how to make those types of opposing moves, because since you stopped being a baby you los that fluidity of independent motion... you already learned all of the coordinated moves you needed to survive as a child.

I'm not sure that would be the proper explanation. Not to boast I can do the circles-in-opposite-directions trick without any difficulty and some other things like splitting my fingers differently on my left and right hands, moving my hears and stopping hiccups, and learning to juggle three balls took me only a few hours. And I probably forgot some more. I also managed to learn to speak English quite well although I was already 35. And I will guess I'm not the only one who can do that kind of things. Different people may be differently gifted. I don't think Mozart learnt to become a musical genius, although I'm sure he had to learn music to reveal his capabilities.

The question would be why so few people have the ability to turn their hands in opposite directions. What might be the downside of it?
EB

 

[Malintent]

Yes. Babies have truly independent motor control... notice how they flail about.. arms and legs all moving in different directions at the same time... this is how they learn how to walk and perform other highly coordinated tasks that they eventually will need to get down to an unconscious act.. it's not like anyone has time to focus on "left, shift weight, right, shift weight..." while trying to cross a room.

that motor skill 'autopilot' we develop comes at the cost of independent fluidity of motion. It just takes way too much brain power to maintain that ability to learn new 'moves'. Same concept with language too... babies are capable of (and do) produce every sound that is used in any spoken language around the world. By a certain point in their development, they 'forget' how to make the sounds that they have not used for the language their parents exposed them to.

So, basically you are too old to learn how to make those types of opposing moves, because since you stopped being a baby you los that fluidity of independent motion... you already learned all of the coordinated moves you needed to survive as a child.

I'm not sure that would be the proper explanation. Not to boast I can do the circles-in-opposite-directions trick without any difficulty and some other things like splitting my fingers differently on my left and right hands, moving my hears and stopping hiccups, and learning to juggle three balls took me only a few hours. And I probably forgot some more. I also managed to learn to speak English quite well although I was already 35. And I will guess I'm not the only one who can do that kind of things. Different people may be differently gifted. I don't think Mozart learnt to become a musical genius, although I'm sure he had to learn music to reveal his capabilities.

The question would be why so few people have the ability to turn their hands in opposite directions. What might be the downside of it?
EB

Well, I was speaking generally... of course there are exceptional people that have a greater capacity to learn novel motor skill tasks and languages, and such.

The disadvantage / downside is that these people are spending internal resources on what humans have evolutionarily deemed wasteful.

 

[Speakpigeon]

.
The disadvantage / downside is that these people are spending internal resources on what humans have evolutionarily deemed wasteful.

So the disadvantage / downside of left-handedness is that left-handed people are spending internal resources on what humans have evolutionarily deemed wasteful?!
Let's ask one Barack Obama what he thinks.
EB

 

[Malintent]

.
The disadvantage / downside is that these people are spending internal resources on what humans have evolutionarily deemed wasteful.

So the disadvantage / downside of left-handedness is that left-handed people are spending internal resources on what humans have evolutionarily deemed wasteful?!
Let's ask one Barack Obama what he thinks.
EB

Handedness is not the same topic as what we were discussing... being ambidextrous is, but left versus right has nothing to do with motor fluidity that is lost with age.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

The question would be why so few people have the ability to turn their hands in opposite directions. What might be the downside of it?
EB

Stuff doesn't need a "down side" to be ignored.

Is it beneficial? No. So evolution won't give a blip about it. It can exist, but mostly as a neutral trait.

 

[Speakpigeon]

The question would be why so few people have the ability to turn their hands in opposite directions. What might be the downside of it?
EB

Stuff doesn't need a "down side" to be ignored.

Is it beneficial? No. So evolution won't give a blip about it. It can exist, but mostly as a neutral trait.

Ok, that's an idea but these tricks probably take some neuronal resources, at least a few connections and a few neurons, so that's at least one downside if these capabilities don't do anything beneficial to the subject. Maybe these were useful at some point in the speciation line and no longer are, without being so costly in terms of resources that they would quickly disappear through selection, especially since humans are so highly gregarious. It's possible that these capabilities have some kind of social usefulness, for example in special jobs and functions.
EB