Typoglycemia

Typoglycemia是個語文上的新字，描述一個有趣的現象，就是當我們閱讀一段英文的時候，只要每個單詞的首尾字母正確，中間的字母被完全打亂也沒有問題，照樣可以正常地被理解。

例如下列的這段文字：

I cdnuol't blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg: the phaonmneel pweor of the hmuan mnid. Aoccdrnig to a rseearch taem at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Scuh a cdonition is arppoiatrely cllaed Typoglycemia. Amzanig huh? Yaeh and you awlyas thguoht slpeling was ipmorantt.

我們稍為費點心機，都可以輕鬆地識別出其原文意思：

I couldn't believe that I could actually understand what I was reading: the phenomenal power of the human mind. According to a research team at Cambridge University, it doesn't matter in what order the letters in a word are, the only important thing is that the first and last letter be in the right place. The rest can be a total mess and you can still read it without a problem. This is because the human mind does not read every letter by itself, but the word as a whole. Such a condition is appropriately called Typoglycemia. Amazing, huh? Yeah and you always thought spelling was important.

事實上中文也有類似的性質，文字順序被打亂，也不會影響正常閱讀的。然而，若果所有的英文字母都隨機被打亂，那就較難閱讀了：

Anidroccg to crad–cniyrrag lcitsiugnis planoissefors at an uemannd utisreviny in Bsitirh Cibmuloa, and crartnoy to the duoibus cmials of the ueticnd rcraeseh, a slpmie, macinahcel ioisrevnn of ianretnl cretcarahs araepps sneiciffut to csufnoe the eadyrevy oekoolnr.

原文意思是：

According to card-carrying linguistics professionals at an unnamed university in British Columbia, and contrary to the dubious claims of the uncited research, a simple, mechanical inversion of internal characters appears sufficient to confuse the everyday onlooker.

網上流傳說這個研究是出自劍橋大學，但其實只是一名諾丁漢大學的研究生，寫給新科學家雜誌刋登的一篇博士論文，而由於實在有趣，所以被人不斷轉載加工，無限地發酵。