Literature and theater abound in famous pairs of contrasting characters.
Everyone knows Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy,
Ralph Kramden and Ed Norton, and Oscar Madison and Felix Unger. Why do we
love these characters so much? Perhaps they humorously remind us that each
of
us is an "odd couple" with contrasting characteristics. And perhaps our
contrasting characteristics result from the cognitive dissonance between our
two
cerebral hemispheres: the left, which controls language and linear thought; and
the right, which controls visual-spatial and non-linear thought. (1)


(1) Mann, H. It’s not so elementary, my dear doctor

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/eletters/338/apr01_1/b1337#211697

Competing interests:
None declared