Another tradition of divination in Iran is called fal-gush. You hide behind a fence and listen to the conversations of people passing by and use it to answer your questions.
And this pretty much explains why a nation like Iran is stuck where it is (for the past n 100 years). No shortage of brains but a corrosive fatalism that became ingrained in the very culture, likely as a consequence of successive disasters of Arab and Mongul invasions. The Persians of lore that managed 3 empires were not fatalistic fools.
[Fair disclosure: born Iranian.]