It deons't mtaetr if smoenoe srcbamles the lteters (so lnog as the frsit and lsat ltertes are the smae)--the hmuan mnid can siltl raed it. Wtah's up wtih taht?

What do you mean—“What’s up with that?”

What do you want to know about it?

And it’s only true if you’re native or highly fluent in English. I don’t know about other languages.

dnot kown but tahts iternsetng

We are, apparently, brilliant.

Fsrit, I tinhk it knid of mkeas you rcesinedor how the hmuan mnid previeces wtiretn lnguagae.
For itncnase, waht do you cnodsier rdnieag?

Why are plopee so hnug up aubot splenilg,
wehn it aepraps the hmaun mnid culond’t crae lses?

Aslo, I tnhik it wulod wrok wtih ohetr lnaguegas (taht use smoe tpye of ahepblat).
Pbrabloy has mroe to do wtih the haumn mnid tahn the Arcamein mnid, no?

Asulagutn: Or jsut ralely lzay?

I wasn’t talking about the American mind, I was talking about different alphabets, as you rightly guessed, Nimis. For example, this little game would not function at all in Chinese.

It probably would not work in Hebrew either because, well actually come to think of it, because they already do a similar thing in Hebrew, and if it was taken any further, it would be impossible. Reading Hebrew is like reading licenseplates. They don’t tell you what the vowels are. You just have to figure it out the same way we were all able to figure out what Nimis’s original question was.

When I was talking about fluency, I was saying you couldn’t play the game in a language you’re not fluent in, which is one reason some people find it so damn hard to learn Hebrew.

I think its amazing

It would be interesting to find out how many languiges it works in.

So lte’s hvae a Fulhter srcmalbe day. All rseopsnes tpyed lkie tihis.

Wow, if I hadn’t just read this question and Nimis’s post without any problem and with out it slowing down my reading I would not have believed it.

I love the way you asked that question.! ;]

Jamie Zawinski has a perl script you can use to do this programmatically.

—

Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Yes, robmandu. That’s what I was just about to say. Because the human mind does not read every letter by itself, but the word as a whole.

Isn’t that obvious, by the fact that we can do this?

And hasn’t everyone already heard of this phenomenon 8000 times?

No offense, but I don’t think this was a Great Question, and I am really surprised it got 4 GQs.

girlofscience, me too

Grilfocesncie: Nnoe tekan. It is an old pnohenemon.
(I’m spiresurd it got fuor Garet Qusenotis mlesyf. )
But, to be fiar, mnay of the qioetsuns on Fetuhlr anre’t nrescelsaiy new.
But the optntropuiy to dscsuis tehm on a qioetsun and asenwr froum is.

The roasen why we do tihs is oivobus. (Taht’s why I dnid’t ask Why is taht?)
I’m mroe iesteerntd in how it tastenlras to defrefnit lenaugags.
Aslo, if lgnaugae is aubot camotomunicin and the mnid deos not crae,
why are we so hnug up aobut dalteis?
It wulod imaiplcte that lugagnae (besedis bisac coamonicutimn)
is aslo auobt smoe knid of iteacletulnl or amadecic satuts.

I’m finding it hard to decode Nimis’ version of the scrambling, yet when other posters do it, I breeze right through the post at a normal speed. (I’ve seen this before and I can always read it at a normal clip.) Is there something unique or patterened about the way Nimis is mixing the letters?

I was unable to read this question as quickly as I could read a normally formatted and spelled question.

Breed: I think the longer the word, the harder it is to decipher.
Also it seems easier to read if you try to at least keep each syllable relatively intact.
And if high and low letters (ie f, k, g, p) were kept more or less in the same area.

cmonucitaoin VS cinutmoimacon

I just wanted to push the envelope a bit.

Lapi: Ability to decipher aside, yes, there’s always the issue of efficiency.