Everyone maps numbers in space. But why don’t we all use the same directions?
For Westerners, numbers and time run left to right. For some Bolivians, any direction will do
Humans tend to map abstract ideas, including numbers and time, in space. Cognitive scientists recently asked Indigenous Bolivians to arrange bananas of varying ripeness, a proxy for time passing, in 3-D space. The participants arranged the bananas by color but rarely in the same direction, they report.
Benjamin Pitt