"BOO HOO, DIOXIDE, EXCEEDED, and DICK COHEN DIED 10 DEC 1883 all have mirror symmetry about a horizontal axis" (198). If these words are held up in front of a mirror they appear to be unchanged. Some short words in conventional typefaces turn into other words when they are transformed. Such as, MOM turns into WOW or up turns into dn, but swim stays the same way. Other words have vertical axis mirror symmetry like bid turns into pig. In 1978 Scott found a way to make "Merry Christmas mirror-symmetrical about the horizontal axis and the following year he found a way to make it mirror-symmetrical about the vertical axis.
"Dozen of readers sent examples of printed words and even sentences that are unreversed in a mirror or which change to other words" (206). The word "Toyota" when written vertically is unaltered by reflection.
With ambigrams there are many different types that can be used. Voices can be transposed to be different pitches, voices can be turned upside down so intervals could go up instead of down. A wide variety of geometric symmetries can be used within the ambigrams.
I wrote about a similar chapter that was about symmetry, dealing mostly about reflections and rotations.I find it really cool how people like Scott Kim are able to make art derived from mathematics. I think it is also fascinating that not only are words symmetrical, but many things in nature like plants have symmetries.
ReplyDeleteYou did a good job getting the main points from the chapter with the symmetry with words. You also did a good job with providing examples for different types of symmetry using different words to show it. Also you did good with telling the difference between horizontal and vertical mirror symmetry.
ReplyDeleteI actually liked reading this chapter because I knew what I what I was reading about. I just started re-learning about horizontal and vertical mirror symmetry in my math class. I also liked the two pictures you used for the vertical and horizontal symmetry examples.This was a good chapter for me to read since I was able to understand it more without re-reading most of the chapter.
ReplyDeleteOne problem I saw with this chapter was that it didn't describe a process in which Scott Kim did his lettering. I think the chapter could have been a lot stronger with that information in it. Also, one thing I struggled with what exactly the purpose of the snake puzzle was. I think that the description was too vague to completely get on grasp on the matter.
ReplyDeleteThis was a really good chapter and it really interested me a lot. One thing i would have changed is to add more details about the process of how he makes his letters. i really liked the examples and everything.
ReplyDeleteI thought that this was a good chapter in the book and you did a decent job of summarizing it. upon finishing the chapter i was also left begging the question of how exactly he managed to create this symmetry. i started thinking of different ways that it could be done using mathematics and the main one that i found to be possibly the easiest would be to plot the vertices of the letters on a graph with line bisecting the graph. then all you had to do was make sure that both sides of the graph had common points and lines connecting the vertices. Did any of the sources you looked up contain any methods as to how he does it?
ReplyDeleteI thought your summary was great at getting to the point and summarizing the chapter well. I had a little previous knowledge of this word symmetry but i never knew who created it or why. I thought that this chapter was very interesting and was the missing puzzle piece to my previous knowledge. I agree with Taylor, Nick, and Robby in that I also want to know a little more on how he creates the letters.
ReplyDeleteI found this chapter really interesting to further extend research on. I found that Kim had early interest in geometrical symmetry and lettering words. I find it crazy how Scott Kim can literally turn more than 260 words into a symmetrical form. The ambigrams became really popular that many people sent in words for him to create a geometric symmetry out of it. Really really fascinating chapter!!
ReplyDeleteI found this summary very insightful and after reading more about Scott Kim and the other ways he discovered how to solve abstract math problems, I find him to be a very interesting person. I find it very interesting Scott Kim started to figure out complex math problems in highschool. Great summary!
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