Hand Made

The hands (med./lat.: manus, pl. manūs) are the two intricate, prehensile, multi-fingered body parts normally located at the end of each arm (medically: "terminating each anterior limb/appendage") of a human or other primate. more...

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They are our chief organs for physically manipulating the environment, using the roughest to the finest motor skills (wielding a club; threading a needle), and since the fingertips contain some of the densest areas of nerve endings on the human body, they are also our richest source of tactile feedback from our environment, so that our sense of touch is intimately associated with our hands. Like other paired organs (eyes, ears, legs), each hand is dominantly controlled by the opposing brain hemisphere, and thus handedness, or preferred hand choice for single-handed activities such as writing with a pen, reflects a significant individual trait.

What constitutes a hand?

Although many mammals and other animals have grasping appendages similar in form to a hand, (ie: paw, claw, talon, etc.), these are scientifically not considered to be so, and have other varying names. Using the term hand to distinguish the terminations of the front paws from the hind ones is merely a scientific usage of anthropomorphization. The only true hands appear in the mammalian order of primates. Hands must also have opposable thumbs, as described later in the text.

Humans have only two hands (except in cases of polymelia), which are attached to the arms. Some say that apes and monkeys have four hands, because the toes are long and the big toe is opposable and can somewhat be used as hands.

Uses of the hand

Grips and Grasps

There are many grips and grasps that each of us uses in our daily life: "key" grasp, "jar" grasp, "trigger grip", "hammer grip", "baseball grip", etc. Beyond everyday grips and grasps, specialists, such as violinists, have special ways of holding objects.

Braille

The tactile sensitivity of the fingers allows the blind or visually impaired to read text in the braille system by running their fingers across raised dots.

Anatomy of the human hand

The human hand consists of a broad palm (metacarpus) with five digits, attached to the forearm by a joint called the wrist (carpus).

Digits

The Four Fingers

Four fingers on the hand are located at the outermost edge of the palm. These four digits can be folded over the palm, this allows for the holding of objects, and furthermore the grasping of small objects. Each finger, starting with the one closest to the thumb, has a colloquial name to distinguish it from the others:

Read more at Wikipedia.org