Sanpaku (pronounced san-pach-ew)
An eye in which the sclera (white of the eye) is visible on three sides of the iris rather than the usual two (left & right).
Pre 1700s: A borrowing from the Japanese 三白 (sanpaku) (three whites) or 三白眼 (sanpaku gan) (three-white eyes). Sanpaku is a noun and sanpakuish is an adjective; the noun plural is sanpakus.
Sanpaku (三白) (three whites) & Sanpaku gan (三白眼) (three-white eyes) are Japanese terms from traditional Chinese & Japanese medicine and they describe the “condition” in which the white of the eye is visible either above or below the iris when looking straight ahead. Although the word was popularized by Japanese educator and nutritionist Nyoichi “George” Ohsawa (1893–1966) when he published the book You Are All Sanpaku in 1965, the idea had existed in oriental medicine probably for centuries although it’s impossible accurately to determine its origin. It was mentioned in the diaries of at least one nineteenth century US Navy physician but attracted no interest in the West until the release of Ohsawa san’s book. In Western medicine the phenomenon is described as “lower scleral show” or “inferior scleral show”, terms which are merely descriptive because (1) it’s something thought within the range of normality, (2) is indicative of no other mental or physical states and thus (3) is generally not considered a medical condition requiring treatment and is attributed variously to (3a) normal variation in eyelid anatomy, (3b) transient facial expression or gaze direction, (3c) traumatic injury or (3d) age-related tissue changes. There are orbital or eyelid conditions (the best known being a thyroid-related eye disease causing lid retraction) which can induce a sanpaku-like appearance but instances are vanishingly rare. In short, the medicalization of sanpaku is thought a product of superstition so predictably, on social media, sanpaku eyes seem to have a cult following.
In You Are All Sanpaku, Ohsawa san described sanpaku as a condition which indicated physical and mental imbalances and discussed its significance in relation to diet and overall well-being. Historically, sanpaku is believed to have entered oriental medicine from the Japanese practice of “face-reading” and those with eyes observed thus were considered ill-fated and destined for a life filled with misfortune, culminating often with an early demise. It gained a following on social media by the usual means: celebrity association. Diana, Princess of Wales, President John Kennedy & Marilyn Munroe, all of whom died young, were all sanpakus and as Ohsawa san warned in You Are All Sanpaku: the eyes indicate someone's fate, signifying imminent danger or an “early and tragic end.”
Diana, Princess of Wales (1961-1997, far left), Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962, centre left), Billie Eilish (b 2001. centre right) and John Kennedy (JFK, 1917–1963; POTUS 1961-1963, far right). Three died young in tragic circumstances but Ms Eilish remains fit and well.
The original basis of “face reading” isn’t known but as a diagnostic tool it focused on the matter of “balance”, something important also to the physicians of Antiquity who identified the “four humors”: flegmat (phlegm), sanguin (blood), coleric (yellow bile) & melanc (black bile) which were the causative agents of the four personality types, the phlegmatic, the sanguine, the choleric & the melancholic. In the East, signs of sanpaku meant a man’s whole system (physical, physiological and spiritual) was out of balance, something caused by sins committed against the order of the universe, accounting for his sickness, unhappiness or insanity. Ohsawa san noted that in the West, such folk had come to be called “accident prone” and they were the ones who should take note of the warning from sanpaku, nature’s tap on the shoulder. A practical author of self-help texts, Ohsawa san recommended sanpaku eyes should be treated with a macrobiotic diet, focusing on brown rice and soybeans, something on which he had real expertise as the founder of the macrobiotic diet.
By their sanpaku you shall know them: Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945, left), crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013, centre) and cult-leader Charles Manson (1934-2017, right).
Interestingly, the beliefs about sanpaku are culturally variable although universally it’s held the condition determines one's fate. In the Japanese tradition those consequences are ill fate and misfortune while the Chinese associate sanpaku with good luck and wealth and this divergence has interested cultural anthropologists who study the symbolism and mythologies of different societies. The tradition divides the eyes into "yin sanpaku" and "yang sanpaku", the roots of this the ancient Chinese concept of yin & yang, representing the duality of opposing yet complementary forces in the universe. Yin and Yang are fundamental concepts in Chinese philosophy and represent complementary and interconnected aspects of the universe. Yin is associated with qualities such as darkness, femininity, passivity, and coldness, while Yang is associated with light, masculinity, activity, and warmth. They’re seen as opposing forces that are in a constant state of dynamic balance and they exist within all phenomena, including human physiology, nature and society. In this they differ from the (wholly un-related) concept in particle physics of matter and anti-matter. Matter is the familiar stuff which is much of the physical universe (particles such as protons, neutrons, and electrons) while anti-matter consists of particles with the same mass as their matter counterparts but carrying an opposite charges. When matter and anti-matter particles come into contact, they can annihilate each other, releasing energy. Ying and Yang, mutually dependent, live in peaceful co-existence.
The Mean Girls (2004) crew demonstrate the range: Rachel McAdams (b 1978, far left) & Lindsay Lohan (b 1986, centre-left) are in the part of the population who are either not sanpakus or the effect is imperceptible. Lacey Chabert (b 1982, centre-right) is in the group with a separation around 1 mm while Amanda Seyfried (b 1985, far right) displays up to 2 mm depending on her expression.
A quadrilateral meeting to discuss German war guilt reparations and allied debts accumulated during World War I (1914-1918): Raymond Poincaré (1860–1934; President of France 1913-1920, far left), Andrew Bonar Law (1858–1923; Prime Minister of the United Kingdom 1922-1923, centre-left), Benito Mussolini (1883-1945; Duce (leader) & Prime-Minister of Italy 1922-1943, centre right) and Georges Theunis (1873–1966; Prime Minister of Belgium 1921-1925 & 1934-1935, far right), 10 Downing Street, London, December 1922.
Before it became a meme, this was an obscure photograph which until the twenty-first century had appeared only in some specialist history texts but as the internet achieved critical mass, memes became a thing and Mussolini’s sanpaku eyes were a gift for the meme-makers, most captions suggesting the duce may have had a sudden premonition of his own unfortunate end although others offered: “I feel naked without a moustache”, “I think I have imposter syndrome”, “Oh God, I just pooped my pants”, “I know one of these men is a Freemason but I don't know which” and “I wonder if they can tell I've smoked some weed”. However, although not noted as a mystic, he may have sensed another's impending death, “sitteth at the right hand”, Andrew Bonar Law then having only months to live.
In Japanese face reading, yang sanpaku eyes (white part visible above the iris) reveal a person's dark and sinister nature, the eyes indicating the unstable mental state suffered by individuals exhibiting uncontrollable aggression, such as psychopathic murderers or serial killers. Yin Sanpaku Eyes (sclera visible below the iris) signify a different physical or mental imbalance, one caused by the abuse of drugs, alcohol, and sugar which disrupt the body's equilibrium. Although discouraged by all in the profession except the odd, entrepreneurial cosmetic surgeon, treatment options are available to “correct” scleral show and the most effect treatment is aesthetic plastic surgery, specifically the procedure called blepharoplasty, which can correct the appearance of the eyes. The construct of blepharoplasty was blepharo- + -plasty. Blepharo- was from the New Latin, from the Ancient Greek βλέφαρον (blépharon) (eyelid; a feature resembling an eyelid) and -plasty was from the Ancient Greek πλαστός (plastós) (molded, formed) which now has the special meaning in medicine meaning "repair, restoration or re-shaping of part of the body with a surgical procedure".
Casual observation suggests sanpaku eyes are far from rare and there are said to be three classes: (1) those with at least a .25 mm (.0098 inch) space between the iris and the upper and lower eyelids, (2) those with a separation of 1 (.0394 inch) mm and (3) those with a gap of 2 mm (.0787 inch) or more. The concition need not manifest as something symmetrical (in the vertical axis), the two elements being (1) Sanpaku inferior: white visible below the iris and (2) Sanpaku superior: white visible above the iris, the latter said often induced when a subject is frightened or physiologically stressed). However although “estimates” have been published, neither the prevalence of the condition nor the distribution within the three (unofficial) groups have ever been the subject of a reputable epidemiological study; because “sanpaku eyes” is not a recognised medical or anthropometric category; funding would thus be hard to secure although, as a purely observational and statistical exercise, presumably not many ethics departments would much be troubled. So, lacking a defined diagnostic entry, there is no standardised measurement threshold and estimates of prevalence are thus almost certainly speculative and thus unreliable. Those with sanpaku eyes should not too much dwell on the numbers and instead flutter their eyelashes and enjoy the admiring glances.
Mean Girls four-way phone call: Eye-rolls (Amanda Seyfried, top right) don't count, a sanpaku defined only by separation maintained when looking ahead or to the side.
Humans are not the only species with a sclera but we are untypical in it being so visible. That humans even have white scleras has interested linguistic anthropologists, evolutionary biologists and other researchers, some offering the Cooperative Eye Hypothesis which suggested the distinctive appearance evolved as a mechanism with non-verbal communication could be enhanced. According to this conjecture, the high visibility of the iris & pupil against the white background allows an interlocutor more easily to track eye movements, helping individuals to understand where others are looking during interactions. Observational studies revealed the way humans and other great apes move their heads and eyes in different ways, humans relying more on eye movements than head movements to see where someone else is looking. Apes, without the white component in their eyes, tend more to move the whole head. Not all support the "cooperative eye" faction but it’s an interesting approach to understanding the evolutionary significance of the human eye's appearance and the sophistication of communication is certainly a noted difference between humans and apes.
As far as is known, all living creatures on Earth came ultimately from a single event which can be said to be the origin of life because at this time, there is no evidence of other living things anywhere in the universe. Everything else is speculative; life may have started (or arrived) here many other times but for whatever reason not thrived and around the universe there may be many forms of life; some may be more advanced than us or we may be unique in our scientific and technological mastery. The single point of origin is why we share elements of DNA (Deoxyribonucleic acid, the so-called “building-blocks of life”) with our cats, dogs, goldfish and bananas so, unsurprisingly, in living creatures, eyes are common, often in pairs but unlike those in humans, not all are out-growths of a brain although, in many of the lineages of the Metazoa they are neurally derived and remain tightly integrated with the central nervous system.
As a general principle it all depended on the developmental origin and phylogeny (the evolutionary history of groups of organisms). In vertebrates (mammals, birds, fish etc), the eye evolved as an evagination (a growth outward) of the forebrain during embryogenesis (the process by which an embryo is formed and develops). Cephalopods (octopus, squid etc) differ in that while the optic lobes of the brain are large and closely connected, the eye is not literally a brain protrusion; thus, while neurally integrated, the eyes are not brain outgrowths. Arthropods (insects, crustaceans and such) have compound eyes formed from ectodermal (of the The outermost of the three tissue layers in the embryo of a metazoan animal) tissues which connect to the brain via optic nerves and are thus also neurally connected but not developmental extensions of the brain itself. Many cnidarians (such as the box jellyfish) possess complex lens eyes but lack a centralized brain, their eyes peripheral sensory structures connecting to nerve rings rather than a true brain. Many invertebrates have relatively simple photoreceptors which can be thought of as “eyespots” which can be distributed across body tissues, the best contemporary comparison probably the sensors now so ubiquitous in electronic devices.
Boobies, one step at a time.
A booby is a seabird in the genus Sula, part of the Sulidae family. Boobies are closely related to the gannets (Morus), which were formerly included in Sula, the genus created in 1760 by the French naturalist Mathurin Jacques Brisson (1723-1806). The name was derived from súla, the Old Norse and Icelandic word for the other member of the family Sulidae, the gannet. The English name booby was based on the Spanish bobo (stupid) as the tame birds often landed on board sailing ships, where they were easily captured and eaten. As well as a popular addition to the diet of sailors for whom meat other than fish was a rarity, it was fortuitous for many, the Admiralty's archives revealing boobies often mentioned as having been caught and eaten by shipwrecked sailors.
As well as charming eyes, boobies also have interesting feet. The distinctive blue feet (the result of pigments ingested from their diet of fish) also play a part in the bobby’s mating ritual although not exactly in the podophilic sense familiar in a sub-set of humans. In the spring mating season, the bird’s feet become a bright turquoise blue and, to demonstrate their health and vitality, conspicuously they will display them to potential partners. The job done, as their eggs hatch, the blue hue fades to something less vivid. One aspect of their behaviour which amused the ornithologists who first observed it was that if among fishers unloading their catch, it tossed a small fish from the by-catch, a booby will take it and waddle off somewhere to enjoy it in solitude rather than gulping it down as in common in many species. Like penguins, although ungainly on land, they are skilled plunge divers which used their streamlined bodies and air sacs “fly” through the water, catching their prey at high speed and they hunt in "packs", coordinating their movement to maximize the catch. Boobies have been recorded diving from as high as 90 m (300 feet), their speed upon entry estimated at around 100 km/h (60 mph).
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