The "right eye"

Which eye should you put a sextant up to take a navigational sighting,does it matter and how do you know which is the "right eye".???

 

Doesn't matter. It is a preference.

 

We all have a dominate eye and this is the one you should use. If you elect to use your other eye, you'll have to fight "parallax", which anyone with some serious shooting experience will attest too.

To find your dominate eye, extend your arm and hold up a finger, placing it over a object in the distance. Close one eye and if your perception of the finger moves, in relation to the object you've covered, then the opposite eye is the dominate one. If it doesn't move, then the eye that's remained open is your dominate eye.

 

Never knew about that, does the dominant eye side normally coincide with the same dominant hand side ?

 

Yes, but if you're like me and were taught to read and wright in a parochial school, where the nuns beat us into being right handed (no kidding), you might not have the same dominate eye.

 

That was pretty common back in the day, and the nuns were in the thick of it here, too ! Right was "right" !

 

So, how many wooden rulers did you take across the knuckles? Remember the little brass straight edge strip, was all that held them together after a good shot, by a skilled nun. I cost them at least a case of rulers.

 

My dominate eye is my left eye and most of the tutorials do not mention such things and tell you to take the sextant in your right hand but not which eye to put the sextant up to.

I have mentioned using your "right eye" to some costal mariners but they think I was a twit but apparently you could be in the wrong place at the wrong time by using your wrong eye depending on the distance of the object from you sighted upon.

A poll would be interesting on who is right eyed and who is left eyed.

 

Using Par's theory, neither of my eyes are dominant. The object and my finger part equal amounts in the opposite direction both sides.
Poida

 

Lucky the Nuns never checked for eyedness.... prolly woulda poked out the devil eye!

& Sally Field always seemed so nice, or is it just school Nuns?

Jeff.

 

I seemed to avoid the worst moods of the nuns, but my older brother did not. Our mother noticed him becoming reluctant to go to school, to the point one day he just refused completely. He opened up about how one of the nuns was belting him around in class. Naturally my mother was intent on getting to the bottom of it, and fronted the head nun, who took her and my brother round to the room where the class was in progress, and the errant sister point blank denied any violence, until some kid stood up and contradicted her, and outlined some of the extra-curricular happenings, which included a medicine ball being thrown at students who didn't have the right answers ! That was the end of her teaching career, she was already pretty old and overdue to retire anyway. Who knows what retribution fell on the boy who spilt the beans, or what may have happened if he didn't.

 

There was a theory that people naturally left handed, forced to be right handed, were more likely to stammer or stutter.

I am right handed and right eye dominant however when I tried rifle shooting in my teens my left eye was sharper which made things very awkward.

 

I think the stammering or stutters were also likely pottie trained at gun point and/or other issues. I'm lefthanded, forced to be right, but am left eye dominate and I don't stutter, though at my age, she suggests I stammer over a few things, possibly because I don't want to do what she's asked.

Poida, I've never heard of an eye neutral person before. How thick are your glasses?

 

Just one small point. The object you place your index finger on should be a vertical post or similar not to far away. I have tried testing people and it takes time for the test to prevail and they get it right.

 

Eye dominance and hand dominance are separate things. The majority of people have the same side, but plenty have opposite. Opposites tend to be more ambidextrous, showing weaker hand dominance. You should use your dominant eye for a sextant, regardless of your dominant hand. Same with shooting guns. Its the eye, not the hand. You can spot the kids that are opposites instantly because they try to sight with their eye opposite from where they are shouldered.

The eye test I use is to hold your hands straight out, make a loop with your thumbs and fingers, sight any object, and bring your hands back to your head while you look at the object. Your hands will arrive at your dominant eye.