Do Swiss use the thumb when counting to three on their hands?

Yes. Many I know do.

I never even realized this before....

Doesn't everyone use their thumb first? except for one and two of course.

If not, then that's not just a Swiss thing.

Does anyone still feel a little shocked when being shown two? That may be a British thing, we always use palm forward unless we want it to mean something else.

Paging Dougal's Breakfast. Where is the fellow now!
If I remember correctly, the Greeks use the thumb last .

no, in the US, one would start with the index finger and the thumb would be used last....for example if you want three of something, would you use the thumb to indicate it as one of the three (perhaps that is a different question)? when I indicate three the the thumb and index would not be used.

in the movie, it was not a Swiss thing but a German thing, but just questioning if it was the same elsewhere.

As an American, I have to be very careful of that when in the UK

Guess not. In my neck of the woods we always counted the thumb last; I'd never seen anybody count thumb-first till I moved here.

Seriously ? I must have been here since forever.... I thought everybody counted with the thumb first. Can't imagine another way.

Don't ask me... I can only count to two.

Italians count with their thumb first, too. Thought a little boy was trying to tell me he was two but his mum corrected me by telling me I had missed his thumb-count bit.

How daft did I look to said three year old not being able to count to three...?

Chinese_number_gestures is a unique way of counting which used to confuse me as i grew up with more the "western" way of counting...
i can't remember precisely but there are a few other differences in other cultures too....

I once read of another system of counting using the hands, base twelve, by counting each number with the thumb on the segment of each finger and using the other hand for multiples. Start with the tip of the index finger and count up, moving down each segment then on to the next finger.

Where does that come from?

To be a real movie spoiler, you need to mention the name of the movie. Can I do it? Can I???

And I'll add that the Australian way is to indicate three with the middle three fingers -- so excluding the thumb and "pinky" (smallest finger). A bit different to dakman, and different again to the German/Swiss/Italian standard.

Really, there should be an ISO standard for finger-counting. At the least, Brussels should step in. If they can legislate the correct curvature of a banana, they can force people to count "properly".

Egypt, possibly ... I'm not totally convinced about the source, though.

Sad though it may be, this started making me think about how I count with the fingers.

I go index, middle, thumb, ring then little. Anyting else just feels really wrong.

How do you count aloud to five? "2, 3, 1, 4, 5"?

Strangely (having just done a dry run), I DO start with my thumb (and run straight along the fingers in sequence) when counting things, but when indicating the number 3 (such as ordering 3 Maseratis, for example), I do it as described before -- excluding thumb and pinky.

Of course, this is how we indicate the number 1 in Australia:

I have no explanation for it, it's just simply how it happens in my hand. Does anyone express the number one with just their thumb?

I guess you are referring to the new Tarantino film. I can confirm this is common in Germany and Switzerland.