Compulsive readers

[John F]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I've seen that example before. While I can figure it out, I can't read it at normal speed without occassionally stopping, backing up, re-reading several words, and/or generally feeling nauseous while doing so.

+1

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[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I've seen that example before. While I can figure it out, I can't read it at normal speed without occassionally stopping, backing up, re-reading several words, and/or generally feeling nauseous while doing so.

I read it at almost normal speed.

[Wearever]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Going by your alias, are you by any chance a pen collector? (Wearever pens: link)

(I've dabbled a bit in fountain pen collecting, trying to find a nice personal 'for life' fountain pen )

Thanks for the link , I didn't know about Wearever fountain pens, they look like nice pens though. My user name is more about my mental block with synonymes. Lol. Just a play on words. I am enjoying the replies here on this thread.

As far as being a compulsive reader, I don't think I am. I just like books that compel me to read them. Lol.

[cvkemp]

Originally Posted by bgalbrecht

I had one friend in college who was such a bad speller that when I proofread his stuff, I found a word that was misspelled 3 times in the same page (different ways, too IIRC). He was an amazingly fast typist though. It might be a form of dyslexia.

I believe it is a form of dyslexia at least for me, and also the fact that I am very hard of hearing and sounding out words just does not do it for me.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

I read it at almost normal speed.

Well almost ... sure.
But at full speed, I had to pause to allow a couple of the words to "resolve." I wouldn't have had to pause on those few if everything had been spelled correctly.

I've always found that experiment a bit humorous, because it claims that spelling is unimportant; yet the entire thing is predicated on the fact that everyone reading it knows how the words are supposed to be spelled.

It doesn't mean spelling is unimportant at all. It simply means that a few transposed letters won't trip up a literate person's comprehension for very long. But if enough people started randomly jumbling the interior letters of many words they wrote, I guarantee future generations (who were educated by those word-jumblers) would start having major difficulties with written communication at some point. Because they'd have no correct frame of reference to begin with.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Wearever

Thanks for the link , I didn't know about Wearever fountain pens, they look like nice pens though. My user name is more about my mental block with synonymes. Lol. Just a play on words. I am enjoying the replies here on this thread.

I suspect you mean "homonyms", not "synonyms".

Homonyms are words that sound the same, but have different meanings (such as "where" and "wear"). Synonyms are different words which have the same meaning.

[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Well almost ... sure.
But at full speed, I had to pause to allow a couple of the words to "resolve." I wouldn't have had to pause on those few if everything had been spelled correctly.

I've always found that experiment a bit humorous, because it claims that spelling is unimportant; yet the entire thing is predicated on the fact that everyone reading it knows how the words are supposed to be spelled.

It doesn't mean spelling is unimportant at all. It simply means that a few transposed letters won't trip up a literate person's comprehension for very long. But if enough people started randomly jumbling the interior letters of many words they wrote, I guarantee future generations (who were educated by those word-jumblers) would start having major difficulties with written communication at some point. Because they'd have no correct frame of reference to begin with.

True. The reason I can read it is because of the way i learned to read (ie, see the words globally). And my brain, expert in scrambling the letters, is also an expert in un-scrambling them.Two words with the same letters, i will sometimes get the wrong one, forcing me to go back when the sentence don't make sense.
In France, they are now pushing to read sylabus per sylabus. Awful for people like me. I resort to that only for words I don't know. Something I don't, only to realize some times later I got it all wrong, because my brain mixed up the letters.

[ebusinesstutor]

I read many books every week as well as a lot of articles and magazines. If I have to wait for my wife in the car for 5-10 minutes, I pull out the smart phone and start reading.

I read a lot, but for me it is a joy, not an addiction or compulsion.

When I am out in nature, I enjoy that. On a nice day, I go out for walks rather than stay and finish a book. I love time with family and friends and I have many other non-reading hobbies.

So for me, my reading hobby is in balance with the rest of my life. But I read voraciously.

[cvkemp]

For me in the past it was having my Nexus 7 in my pocket at all times. Now it is my new Kindle PW2. I am a slow reader but I do read at time that I have even a few minutes.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by HarryT

JB, if you read so much, why is your spelling so awful? Do you not take in how to spell words correctly as you're reading them?

I've checked the post for spelling errors and I've only found two words misspelled. I did not check for grammar, just misspelled words.

[barryem]

I read because I enjoy it but there is a bit of compulsion as well. Nothing overwhelming. I like to read. I like to eat peanuts. When I've had what I think are enough peanuts I still want a few more. Reading is like that with me.

As for spelling, I've always felt that spelling was important. Also I've always been a very poor speller. I've worked on that actively since I got out of school. Very few days go by where I don't do something to try to improve my spelling, usually several times. I'm much better now than I used to be. I might have almost reached a "poor" level.

I'm also a pretty fast typist. Nothing resembling lightning but I'm faster than most people I know. I do make an occasional typo but that has nothing to do with my spelling problem. When I type I don't think about letters. I think about words and phrases and sentences. My fingers translate those into letters. It's entirely unconscious.

As I typed this post I've tried to be pretty careful with my spelling but I'm intentionally not checking it. Of course Chrome is and it caught me leaving the 's' out of "unconscious". I'm grateful for any such help from on high.

Barry

[Nabeel]

It's an interesting example. I'm aware that I read at different speeds: sometimes reading every word carefully, sometimes most words, and sometimes skimming the obvious stuff. One result of this is that I find poetry very difficult to read, because you must read every word.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by HarryT

JB, if you read so much, why is your spelling so awful? Do you not take in how to spell words correctly as you're reading them?

Why should you? Since the brain is reading the whole word and not the individual letters I would guess that reading and especially reading fast will not make you spell better. I think I spell words the more I read...

[Wearever]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I suspect you mean "homonyms", not "synonyms".

Homonyms are words that sound the same, but have different meanings (such as "where" and "wear"). Synonyms are different words which have the same meaning.

Thanks Harry, I mix up those too. I meant homonyms.

[Jack Torrance]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I've checked the post for spelling errors and I've only found two words misspelled. I did not check for grammar, just misspelled words.

Because grammar Nazi.