Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 179 posts

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#161

Post by karaterobot »

standardly wrote: post #117
karaterobot wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There were enough basic grammatical errors in that article—not to mention a general lack of clarity and specificity—that I initially wondered whether it was a preprint, or maybe somebody's blog. But no.

"According to this hypothesis, the gesture was a secret sign used to recognize crypto-jews each other" "According to this hypothesis, the gesture was a secret sign used to recognize masonic followers each other" I have never heard this verbiage before... Did an AI write this? Or, can someone explain to me how "used to recognize followers each other" is grammatically sound?

> Did an AI write this?

I think you know an AI didn't generate the sentence because it's ungrammatical.

The publication in question (Acta Biomed) is oriented around "mainly national and international scientific activities from Mediterranean and Middle Eastern countries", so there's a reasonable chance none of the the authors speak English as a first language. This in no way excuses bad editing—the journal publishes in English, after all.

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#163

Post by saghm »

flir wrote: post #143
judahmeek wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're allowed to create a hypothetical question that translates a hierarchy of guards into Boolean logic, then it doesn't matter how many guards there are.

What are you thinking? I was wondering about dividing them into sets.

"What would each of the other 49 guards would say the 49 guards other than them would do?" It would be a pain to do the deduction from all of that info, but it seems like it would be enough enough. Maybe it would make more sense to have that guard write down the answer (and throw in a pencil and a few extra sheets of paper)...

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#164

Post by mordymoop »

carabiner wrote: post #111
mordymoop wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I absently place my hand on my chest, the resulting configuration looks just like the “unnatural” one in the painting.

Maybe because you're biased having read the article? I just looked at a picture of me waving at the camera taken 2 weeks ago, and my fingers are splayed apart with even spacing.

When I rotate my hand toward my body the middle fingers come together, when it rotate it away they fan out. I can feel this happening in the tension of my muscles and ligaments during rotation. In contrast, pulling my two middle fingers together on purpose with my hand held out, without also pulling together all my fingers, feels weird. I simply think this is a mechanically likely think to happen due to the design of the forearm, though it may not be the case for everyone depending on tension and strength and anatomy.

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#165

Post by DontchaKnowit »

DonHopkins wrote: post #104
DontchaKnowit wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I dont know that, because it is false. The hand symbol is a running joke about looking at someone elses testicles. The peoppe that play this game are rowdy adolescent boys. Those boys went online and made ironic racist jokes, as young boys do, and now somehow people think its a symbol of white power. Anyone who knows whats going on is laughing at your foolishness.

So let me get this right: you're only PRETENDING to be wrong and stupid, so you can laugh at us for thinking you're wrong and stupid. Wow, you totally owned us by acting just like a teenage boy! I get it, now that you've admitted that you're just playing a trolling game, and don't actually believe anything you're saying, just like those teenage boys whose behavior you're defending and emulating. So there's no point i…

Youre a disinginous cunt, just fyi. You've succesfully riled me up, which was clearly your goal, but youve still failed to make any kind of sense or construct a cohesive argument, so respectfully, you can suck my entire dick.

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#166

Post by DonHopkins »

DontchaKnowit wrote: post #165
DonHopkins wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So let me get this right: you're only PRETENDING to be wrong and stupid, so you can laugh at us for thinking you're wrong and stupid. Wow, you totally owned us by acting just like a teenage boy! I get it, now that you've admitted that you're just playing a trolling game, and don't actually believe anything you're saying, just like those teenage boys whose behavior you're defending and emulating. So there's no point i…

Youre a disinginous cunt, just fyi. You've succesfully riled me up, which was clearly your goal, but youve still failed to make any kind of sense or construct a cohesive argument, so respectfully, you can suck my entire dick.

Your "boys will be boys" argument is obviously self-serving, because you're acting exactly like the worst kind of teenage boy edgelord, living in his mother's basement, trolling on 4chan, participating in Gamergate. You keep making provably false claims and ignoring the evidence, and in spite of your baseless arguments to the contrary, teenage boys certainly can be racist, and teenage boys aren't the only ones using the "ok" symbol with racist intent. How about not trying to defend and justify that behavior, at the same time you're exhibiting a textbook case of that pathological behavior. It totally discredits your baseless arguments.

You're trying to argue that it's only to rile people up, with no racist intent, then you're getting totally riled up yourself, defending intentional racists. So what's wrong with me successfully doing the exact same thing you're trying to defend, back to you? According to your own words, I should be laughing at you. If you don't like being on the receiving end, then perhaps you shouldn't be defending people who dish it out.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/roger-stone-proud-boys/

Roger Stone is 71 years old, not a teenage boy. He was convicted of seven felony charges, including witness tampering, lying to congress, and obstruction, in relation to special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation, and he's a trusted advisor to Donald Trump who had White House access and still hangs out with him at Mar-a-Lago. Not a teenaged boy for 52 years, but definitely a racist hanging out with a bunch of other racists. And here you are defending him, with your idiotic "boys will be boys" argument, while acting just like a teenage boy yourself.

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#167

Post by lkdfjlkdfjlg »

guerrilla wrote: post #160
lkdfjlkdfjlg wrote: post #155

It's just a matter of style. People copy the styles that they identify themselves with/aspire to. Artist copy each other, black kids copy 50cent, white kids copy jake paul, gay men copy each others feminine affectations. Once you notice it, it's everywhere.

> gay men copy each others feminine affectations Do you know of research on this? I have two gay friends with feminine speech and both are adamant that they don't choose to have this and would prefer not to. Each has their own theory as to why they have it. One suspects it might be (epi)genetic while another suspects its influenced by being raised by women. I can't buy the latter since many very masculine straight me…

I don't have any research, no. Never searched for it either.

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#168

Post by vinnyvichy »

082349872349872 wrote: post #141
scifi wrote: post #77

I just wanted to add something I didn't see mentioned in the article or the discussion. In the Christian tradition, figures are often portrayed with their pinky and ring fingers curled up, while the thumb, index, and middle fingers are extended. This is done to symbolize the holy trinity.

> ...with their pinky and ring fingers curled up, while the thumb, index, and middle fingers are extended. leading to a local joke: Q. How can you spot a forester on a Saturday night? A. (while making sign above) 5 beers, please!

Not Poire, then

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#169

Post by 082349872349872 »

vinnyvichy wrote: post #168
082349872349872 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...with their pinky and ring fingers curled up, while the thumb, index, and middle fingers are extended. leading to a local joke: Q. How can you spot a forester on a Saturday night? A. (while making sign above) 5 beers, please!

Not Poire, then

And here I'd thought « entre la poire et le fromage » ?

(William the first may have preferred calvados, and the current William is unlikely to be based enough to style himself William the last [ending the monarchy in 2066], but I prefer my Williams in a bottle)

Re: Secret Hand Gestures in Paintings (2019)

#170

Post by flir »

saghm wrote: post #163
flir wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you thinking? I was wondering about dividing them into sets.

"What would each of the other 49 guards would say the 49 guards other than them would do?" It would be a pain to do the deduction from all of that info, but it seems like it would be enough enough. Maybe it would make more sense to have that guard write down the answer (and throw in a pencil and a few extra sheets of paper)...

"Label the guards, 1 to 50, starting with you as 1, the guard to your left as 2, etc. For each guard, tell me what answer they would give if I asked them if your door was safe".

If all the guards say the same thing, you're talking to the lying guard. Otherwise the liar is simply the one that answers differently.

Would that work? I think so.

Post reply on HN