Drive on the left/left handed?

[Joenavy85]

Originally Posted by Arragonis

I'm just in awe you found a Lotus with a working component

She does all the routine stuff herself (since it's past warranty now) and has never had any problems at all.

[Arragonis]

What a woman....

[Peter7307]

I was thinking exactly that same thing!

Peter.

[Peter7307]

Originally Posted by Piwoslaw

OK, back to driving. I read somewhere here that historically, a knight would hold his lance in his right hand, so when riding towards each other in a duel one would want his opponent to be on his right side.

I am no expert on this but I thought knights held the lance under the right arm and across the body thus facing their opponent who was on their left.

The idea being if the knight struck another with the lance it would not push back directly but at an angle thus lessening the force attempting to shift them out of the saddle.

Anyone know for certain?

Peter

[Fat Charlie]

I'd guess a horseman would have his spear in the right hand and shield in the left because that's how a righty would carry his stuff.

As to angles and force, I'm probably giving cavalrymen way too much credit (easy to do) but if I were on a horse in that situation I'd make sure my shield was facing the other guy no matter what. You can always make another run or get another stick but you probably can't take being gored more than once, so oncoming horses would be on my left every time. That might possibly explain why most places drive on the right, but I don't think it would explain driving on the left.

The one time I took a Land Rover for a spin I was so relieved to find that the pedals were in the same places that "close to me or away from me" wasn't a problem. I'd feel safer with "close to me or away from me" than "up to the left no matter where you're sitting," though.

[Thymeclock]

Originally Posted by Peter7307

I am no expert on this but I thought knights held the lance under the right arm and across the body thus facing their opponent who was on their left.

The idea being if the knight struck another with the lance it would not push back directly but at an angle thus lessening the force attempting to shift them out of the saddle.

Anyone know for certain?

Peter

It goes back much further than that, to Roman times and the Latin terms of dexter and sinister.

We get our word for dexterity and that of being right handed from 'dexter', and the word 'sinister' describes being anything other than that.

[Arragonis]

Jousting is still done today at shows and things, not sure how accurate it.



I met a guy who was a professional sword fighting trainer at the Robin Hood show in Nottingham a couple of years ago - as in proper long swords, two handed Conan the Barbadian stylee sword fighting - and he explained the lengths he goes to get accurately made weapons and his collection of materials on techniques from the periods involved - dark ages mainly.

I didn't have a go at sword fighting, only longbow shooting which according to law as an Englishman I am supposed to practice every Sunday, just in case the French kick off again...

Originally Posted by Thymeclock

...We get our word for dexterity and that of being right handed from 'dexter', and the word 'sinister' describes being anything other than that.

Yep, it was applied to left-handers for a while.

[Cd]

So if a person lifts dumbells with only one arm is it actually possible to have one skinny arm and one big arm ? My guess would be of course not .

[Thymeclock]

Originally Posted by Cd

So if a person lifts dumbells with only one arm is it actually possible to have one skinny arm and one big arm ? My guess would be of course not .

You guessed wrong. It's not just possible, it is what will happen. One arm will be more developed than the other.

[euromodder]

Originally Posted by larrybuck

If you are Euromodder, vtec-e, Piwoslaw, and of course; Arragonis, and anyone else w a right sided steering wheel, and left hand shift:...................................and also left side steering wheel, right shift, but YOU are left handed:............ Do you drive enough that you have actually built up muscle in your Off arm, so that its almost as strong as what HANDED you were born with??

With the exception of those weird islanders, we drive on the right right side in Europe.

Use both hands on the wheel
Powersteering has largely eliminated the need for muscle in a car.

If you are born, and raised in a country where you always shift w your left hand, I'm sure after the beginning, it becomes normal.

Having driven a right-hand-drive car a few times, even on the continent, it's really not an issue.

It's like changing from an automatic back to a manual shifter, you may forget the clutch a few times but that's it.

Driving on the wrong side of the road is also a matter of habit.
I've racked up so many miles on UK roads that driving on the left is just about as normal to me as driving on the right elsewhere.
Somewhere below the Channel it seems an internal switch gets flicked, and I swiftly switch sides

Of course, for all of the situations above, an ambidextrous ( I know SP, don't use this word much) person would do the best. What % of people would be in that group?

Very, very few people really fall in that group.

In my 42 years on this planet, I've only come across a single person who I know is really ambidextrous : i.e. able to write different texts with both hands simultaneously.