Comments on: Can You Read This?

By: Eddie Awad

Eddie Awad — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 00:01:34 +0000

My 8yo son was able to read it without mistakes. I guess it starts as early as you learn how to read.

By: joel garry

joel garry — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 22:19:03 +0000

I knew this had been around forever (in net terms), so I poked about and got some odd results from google groups (those links seem to be bbs's rather than usenet).

By: Eddie Awad

Eddie Awad — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 18:43:38 +0000

I’m going to see if my 8yo son can read it too. But if he can, he will have no motivation for spelling words correctly.

By: byte64

byte64 — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 07:43:31 +0000

Yeah, it’s amazing, it’s all about neural networks combined with context decision performed by that “unparalleled” parallel calculus machine called brain.

That also explains why normally we can leave a fair amount of typos in the text we write, because we need to put special attention in order to detect letter swapping.

Actually the brain reads entire chunks of text, not single letters or words (unless you are reading a language you don’t know) and not only from left to right, but also the other way around. By exercising these capabilities you can achieve “speed reading”.

Ciao! Flavio

By: David Aldridge

David Aldridge — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 06:55:07 +0000

It's interesting stuff alright. I wonder what level of reading competency that effect kicks in at? There must be some point at which the brain switches over from decoding each word from the individual letters to interpreting the entirety.

I must test my kids this evening and see how they do.