Desicritics Category: Culture: Supernatural

Does Palmistry Work?

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 00:19:06 EST

Does Palmistry Work? The answer is yes. You can predict behaviour based upon certain medico-engineering facts based upon your hand measurements. But a bit of history before this. Once upon a time, in the dim and distant past, I was laid up on a hospital bed for months on end. At that time, I was handed a copy of Cheiro's Palmistry book. As it so happens, its available on Project Gutenberg as a free downloadable e-book. Knock yourself out. At that time, I was a spotty teenager and soon got into it. Besides the obvious benefits of getting to hold women's hands and saying profound but totally BS stuff that spotty teenagers do to impress girls, it was fun.

But I did dig around a bit about this palmistry business. Did you know this stuff emerged from India from our old friend, Valmiki? Who wrote a treatise on this subject. But two things sort of made Palmistry a bit of sense to me. The first was that after my accident and being on crutches for well over 18 months made the lines of my hand change. I had a different palm line structure in 1987 and by 1988, the lines on my right hand were significantly different from what they were before.

Second was a scientific explanation. Did you know that the palm area is one of areas of the skin which has the highest density of nerve endings? Given that you and your behaviour is driven quite significantly by your nervous system, it made sense to understand that the lines made on the palm have something to do with the nerve endings and thus have some predictive ability.

Also, let us not forget the fact that the development of the opposable thumb is one indication of the difference between us and the animals. The very fact that we have opposable thumbs means that we have fine motor skills and our intellectual development path has diverged from the animals. For example, the fact that we have a thumb means that writing is possible. So, our hands and digits do have "stuff" to do with our own personal development. But I am slightly drifting from the point.

But its a childish pursuit, fit only for people who are not confident enough to rely on their own skills but require confirmation from others. That's what I thought about the range of studies relating to jewels, palmistry, astrology, numerology and the like (even though I ended up studying them way too much, but then, you dont have much option when you are stiffed inside the hospital bed for months on end).

But others do believe in it. My own marriage came nearly a cropper when my father in law spotted the length of the fingers on my right hand. See above on the fingers of my right hand (its on the left) (and no jokes on hairy hobbit hands and feet, I have heard them all!). The middle and ring fingers are roughly of equal length, in fact, the ring finger is slightly longer even than the middle finger as is the case on my right hand. Guess what he said? He said that people with that condition are great gamblers. He gave me a very suspicious look and mumbled something about how his daughter will be married to a gambler and how that's not good and and and. Close shave, I tell you, I had to talk very quickly. But he still gives me a pained look whenever we meet.

So since then, I spasmodically do the palmistry stuff, usually when I am drunk or when I am drunk. But you know what I mean, its only for a bit of a laugh and fun. But not true.

Here's an experiment which you can do. Go grab a ruler or a scale. Measure the length of your index finger from the knuckle to the tip and the same with your ring finger. Then divide the 2 numbers. The higher the ratio, the bigger is your ability to do do profitable trades. This ratio is called as the 2D:4D ratio. I quote:

Traders with the lowest 2D:4D ratios had an average annual income of £680,000 – 11 times higher than those with the highest ratios. The ratios, measured from photocopies of volunteers’ hands, ranged from 0.90 to 1.02.

I further quote:

Researchers at Cambridge university have found a strong statistical link between the profitability of male traders at a London bank and the ratio of index to ring fingers on their right hand. The longer the fourth digit in relation to the second, the more money the traders are likely to make.
This ratio, known as “2D:4D”, is affected by the amount of male hormone to which people are exposed while growing in their mother’s womb.

Previous research has shown that higher prenatal exposure to testosterone and other male hormones leads to a lower 2D:4D ratio. Finger ratios have been used to predict performance in competitive sports.

Go now you have ended up with another scientific explanation for human performance as measure by bio-engineering factors on the hand. So Palmistry does seem to work in certain aspects. Now where is the damn parrot?

Technorati Tags: Humour,Financial Institutions,trading

Was Ayyappa a Tool to Fight Conversion?

Suresh Naig — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 12:39:02 EST

Ayyappa's shrine is situated on the hills named as Sabarimala in south Kerala. Sabarimala - a part of Western Ghats, in Pathanamthitta district is adjoining other hilly districts of Kottayam and Idukki. I had undertaken pilgrimage to this shrine regularly, for more than five times and out of which, three times I had trekked the long path from Erumeli to Sabarimala, walking for two days and spending a night in the temporary sheds enroute.

Besides visiting these hilly regions on religious pilgrimage, I also visited all the above mentioned three districts professionally for over a decade. This article is the result of some loud thinking, leaving behind the religious passion.

The legend of Ayyappa goes like this. Ayyappa is the avatar of Shiva and Vishnu, the followers of these two deities, known as Shivities and Vaishnavites respectively, always at conflict with each others’ philosophy. Ayyappa took this avatar to conquer a demon named Mahisi, who was tormenting people to stop the traditional worship and terrorising them to worship her instead.

The king of the province, Pandala Raja, did not have an issue and happened to come across the abandoned Devine child Ayyappa in the forest, by the pre-determined design of Vishnu. The abandoned child Ayyappa was growing in the kingdom nurtured by its foster parents, until the queen was blessed with her own son. So as to do away with the foster son, the queen cunningly dispatched Ayyappa to the forest to fetch the milk of a tiger, to cure her stomach ache. In the forest Ayyappa encountered Mahisi and destroyed her to fulfil his purpose of birth. He not only abdicated the throne, in favour of the biological offspring and vowed to stay celibate, so that even his future generation would not demand the throne of the Kingdom.

Before conquering Mahisi, he had conquered Vavar, a muslim trader who had landed on the coast and after conquering he had become a close friend of Ayyappa. Even now people who are on pilgrimage to Sabarimala are expected to pay their obeisance at the dargah of Vavar at Erumeli.

Ayyappa should have been a recent existence, because of the character Vavar, a muslim. Muslims’ entry into Kerala started only from 13th Century onwards. To my knowledge Ayyappa’s existence does not find place in any works earlier to 19th century. We can safely presume then, that Ayyappa came into existence only 200 years back, i.e. after the missionaries started propagating Christianity in the hilly regions of Kottayam.

Perhaps the major plank of conversion was the divide between Shivites and Vaishnavites, and the caste system in Hinduism. Hence Ayyappa was depicted as an outcome of Shiva and Vishnu. Caste system is underplayed in Sabarimala, again to curtail fodder for the missionaries.

When fighting a common enemy, enemy’s enemy becomes a natural friend and that’s how Vavar had become a friend of Ayyappa and collectively they wanted to fight the spread of Mahisi’s religion-read Christianity. A leaf is drawn from Christianity in the making of Ayyappa, granting celibacy as the highest virtue for God, forbidding women of fertile age from visiting the shrine.

I presume Ayyappa could have been a real character akin to Lakshmananda of Kandhamal, succeeded in reconverting many to Hindu fold, or could have been a figment of imagination aimed to dissuade conversion.

Partial Solar Eclipse Today - Do Nothing

Deepti Lamba — Fri, 1 Aug 2008 02:36:38 EDT

Listen up people! If you are pregnant, if you want to go to the awesome sale at Lifestyle, if you want to cut your hair, your nails, or any part of your body for whatever perverse reasons - Don't!! And while you are at if you are about to take up any new venture - Don't - be it meeting a prospective mate or even getting lucky for the first time.

Hold your horses, your ovaries, your sperms, your purse strings - just hold on. If you happen to be a devout believer, it would be for the best if you stayed at home altogether and did nothing.

No karma is to be implemented. Lead a zombie existence. No food to be touched, hair not to be washed, nothing!! There is bad luck and pollution in the air since there is going to be a partial eclipse!!

A partial solar eclipse will be seen in India on Friday while the north-eastern parts of the country will see quite a large fraction of the disc of the Sun, eclipsed by the Moon.

"The partial eclipse will be seen in the north-eastern region, starting from about 4 PM," Director Nehru Planetarium, Rathnasree, said.

The biggest and the last phase of the eclipse will be visible from most parts of the country, except Nagaland and Mizoram, where the eclipse ends after sunset, she said.

The maximum obscuration of the sun will occur at Sibsagar in Assam.

A total eclipse will be visible in Canada extending across northern Greenland, the Arctic, central Russia, Mongolia and China.

In case any of the above activities are performed or there is the moronic viewing of the eclipse people should report to the nearest 'shudhi' center for isolation and decontamination.