TedTest

From the Ted Talk by Alex Rosenthal and George Zaidan: The case of the missing fractals

Unscramble the Blue Letters

It was a night like any other night, except here I was cnmiblig the platonic pkaes like reomo on a second date. (ugh) I was there for the dame. She had eyes like imaginary numbers and curves that went on forever. Said she wanted to go home. Said I could help. Said the pay was good. Didn't say anything about climbing a... Voice: "Who's there?" Manny Brot: "Manny Brot, private eye." Voice: "What are you doing here?" "A pttrey nuembr sent me to find a stolen dingus." Voice: "Well, to enter the cave, you must answer my riddles three." What was it with riddles, and why do they always come in trhees? "Is it an egg?" "No. Why would it be an egg?" "It's usually an egg." "What can I hold in my hand, but has zero area?" "Is it a dodo egg?" "It's not an egg!" I took out the rock that had nearly brained me before and gave it a hard ponder. The size of the rising bump on my conk said to me that this thing had area, and a lot of it. But what if I carved out a triangle from this side here? As any mook could see, this triangle had a quarter of the area of the full tnrilage. I did the same thing again with each of the smaller triangles. Again, a quarter of the remaining area — gone. And I just kept going. After an infinite number of cuts, I was satisfied that my triangle had zero area. A bdnuoed shape with zero area. Now, it's not often that I surprise myself, but my own two mitts had created something crazy, and new. "Very good. (ahem) Now, show me a shape with fntiie area, but an infinitely long perimeter." "Let me get this straight. If I want to make a snip in the bderor of this sahpe, somoth it out, and lay it on the gronud ... " "It would go on for ... " "Wait 'til I'm through, and then you can talk. It would go on forever." "Are you through?" "Yeah." "So show me that shape then." Mmm ... I hadn't been this stuck since the Rubik's Cube fiasco of '58. All the shapes I knew had perimeters. Circles: 2πr. Triangles: sum of their sides. What's this? An angle. An alnge from heeavn. What if I were to pinch each side, like so. A third of the way through, just so. And do it again, and again, and again. After each pcinh, the perimeter got a third longer because where there had been three line segments, now there were four. As for the area, every pinch made more tnegrails, that's true. But those triangles were getting smaller and smlelar. You could say that the area was cgonenrvig, approaching a fixed number, while the perimeter was just getting bigger and bigger, uncontrollably ballooning like an overindulgent birthday clown. After infinity pchines, flimflam, there it was: Finite area, but iniftnie prtmieeer. Now that is a picee of work. "Oh, you're good. (ahem) Riddle three: Show me a picture that if I magnify it under my microscope, I'll keep seeing the original picture, no matter how much I zoom in." "You're a strange little man." "Thank you." I was out of iades, so I loekod at my muse, my complex Dora. Voice: "Who's the dame?" And then it hit me. "She's a heart breaker, my fractal femme fatale. Will she do?" "Yes, she'll do just fine." (lhtgnniig) It was dark, and at first I thought the cave was empty, but then I noticed: the box. The dame had played me like a triangle. She had told me she wanted to go home. (Lightning) What she really weatnd was to bring her home here. The fractals spread everywhere. Most of them the same no matter how deep you looked at them, like Dora's mugshot. Some had infinitely long preemrteis, others were objects with no area or volume, all of them created through infinite rittepeion. So, you wanted to know what fractals are? Well, kid, they're the stuff that dreams are made of. (Music)

Open Cloze

It was a night like any other night, except here I was ________ the platonic _____ like _____ on a second date. (ugh) I was there for the dame. She had eyes like imaginary numbers and curves that went on forever. Said she wanted to go home. Said I could help. Said the pay was good. Didn't say anything about climbing a... Voice: "Who's there?" Manny Brot: "Manny Brot, private eye." Voice: "What are you doing here?" "A ______ ______ sent me to find a stolen dingus." Voice: "Well, to enter the cave, you must answer my riddles three." What was it with riddles, and why do they always come in ______? "Is it an egg?" "No. Why would it be an egg?" "It's usually an egg." "What can I hold in my hand, but has zero area?" "Is it a dodo egg?" "It's not an egg!" I took out the rock that had nearly brained me before and gave it a hard ponder. The size of the rising bump on my conk said to me that this thing had area, and a lot of it. But what if I carved out a triangle from this side here? As any mook could see, this triangle had a quarter of the area of the full ________. I did the same thing again with each of the smaller triangles. Again, a quarter of the remaining area — gone. And I just kept going. After an infinite number of cuts, I was satisfied that my triangle had zero area. A _______ shape with zero area. Now, it's not often that I surprise myself, but my own two mitts had created something crazy, and new. "Very good. (ahem) Now, show me a shape with ______ area, but an infinitely long perimeter." "Let me get this straight. If I want to make a snip in the ______ of this _____, ______ it out, and lay it on the ______ ... " "It would go on for ... " "Wait 'til I'm through, and then you can talk. It would go on forever." "Are you through?" "Yeah." "So show me that shape then." Mmm ... I hadn't been this stuck since the Rubik's Cube fiasco of '58. All the shapes I knew had perimeters. Circles: 2πr. Triangles: sum of their sides. What's this? An angle. An _____ from ______. What if I were to pinch each side, like so. A third of the way through, just so. And do it again, and again, and again. After each _____, the perimeter got a third longer because where there had been three line segments, now there were four. As for the area, every pinch made more _________, that's true. But those triangles were getting smaller and _______. You could say that the area was __________, approaching a fixed number, while the perimeter was just getting bigger and bigger, uncontrollably ballooning like an overindulgent birthday clown. After infinity _______, flimflam, there it was: Finite area, but ________ _________. Now that is a _____ of work. "Oh, you're good. (ahem) Riddle three: Show me a picture that if I magnify it under my microscope, I'll keep seeing the original picture, no matter how much I zoom in." "You're a strange little man." "Thank you." I was out of _____, so I ______ at my muse, my complex Dora. Voice: "Who's the dame?" And then it hit me. "She's a heart breaker, my fractal femme fatale. Will she do?" "Yes, she'll do just fine." (_________) It was dark, and at first I thought the cave was empty, but then I noticed: the box. The dame had played me like a triangle. She had told me she wanted to go home. (Lightning) What she really ______ was to bring her home here. The fractals spread everywhere. Most of them the same no matter how deep you looked at them, like Dora's mugshot. Some had infinitely long __________, others were objects with no area or volume, all of them created through infinite __________. So, you wanted to know what fractals are? Well, kid, they're the stuff that dreams are made of. (Music)

Solution

bounded
smooth
infinite
pinch
finite
triangles
piece
pretty
perimeters
romeo
number
threes
angle
ideas
border
wanted
perimeter
heaven
lightning
climbing
peaks
smaller
triangle
ground
pinches
looked
converging
shape
repetition

Original Text

It was a night like any other night, except here I was climbing the platonic peaks like Romeo on a second date. (ugh) I was there for the dame. She had eyes like imaginary numbers and curves that went on forever. Said she wanted to go home. Said I could help. Said the pay was good. Didn't say anything about climbing a... Voice: "Who's there?" Manny Brot: "Manny Brot, private eye." Voice: "What are you doing here?" "A pretty number sent me to find a stolen dingus." Voice: "Well, to enter the cave, you must answer my riddles three." What was it with riddles, and why do they always come in threes? "Is it an egg?" "No. Why would it be an egg?" "It's usually an egg." "What can I hold in my hand, but has zero area?" "Is it a dodo egg?" "It's not an egg!" I took out the rock that had nearly brained me before and gave it a hard ponder. The size of the rising bump on my conk said to me that this thing had area, and a lot of it. But what if I carved out a triangle from this side here? As any mook could see, this triangle had a quarter of the area of the full triangle. I did the same thing again with each of the smaller triangles. Again, a quarter of the remaining area — gone. And I just kept going. After an infinite number of cuts, I was satisfied that my triangle had zero area. A bounded shape with zero area. Now, it's not often that I surprise myself, but my own two mitts had created something crazy, and new. "Very good. (ahem) Now, show me a shape with finite area, but an infinitely long perimeter." "Let me get this straight. If I want to make a snip in the border of this shape, smooth it out, and lay it on the ground ... " "It would go on for ... " "Wait 'til I'm through, and then you can talk. It would go on forever." "Are you through?" "Yeah." "So show me that shape then." Mmm ... I hadn't been this stuck since the Rubik's Cube fiasco of '58. All the shapes I knew had perimeters. Circles: 2πr. Triangles: sum of their sides. What's this? An angle. An angle from heaven. What if I were to pinch each side, like so. A third of the way through, just so. And do it again, and again, and again. After each pinch, the perimeter got a third longer because where there had been three line segments, now there were four. As for the area, every pinch made more triangles, that's true. But those triangles were getting smaller and smaller. You could say that the area was converging, approaching a fixed number, while the perimeter was just getting bigger and bigger, uncontrollably ballooning like an overindulgent birthday clown. After infinity pinches, flimflam, there it was: Finite area, but infinite perimeter. Now that is a piece of work. "Oh, you're good. (ahem) Riddle three: Show me a picture that if I magnify it under my microscope, I'll keep seeing the original picture, no matter how much I zoom in." "You're a strange little man." "Thank you." I was out of ideas, so I looked at my muse, my complex Dora. Voice: "Who's the dame?" And then it hit me. "She's a heart breaker, my fractal femme fatale. Will she do?" "Yes, she'll do just fine." (lightning) It was dark, and at first I thought the cave was empty, but then I noticed: the box. The dame had played me like a triangle. She had told me she wanted to go home. (Lightning) What she really wanted was to bring her home here. The fractals spread everywhere. Most of them the same no matter how deep you looked at them, like Dora's mugshot. Some had infinitely long perimeters, others were objects with no area or volume, all of them created through infinite repetition. So, you wanted to know what fractals are? Well, kid, they're the stuff that dreams are made of. (Music)

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations

ngrams of length 2

collocation	frequency
infinitely long	2

Important Words

ahem
angle
answer
approaching
area
ballooning
bigger
birthday
border
bounded
box
brained
breaker
bring
brot
bump
carved
cave
climbing
clown
complex
conk
converging
crazy
created
cube
curves
cuts
dame
dark
date
deep
dingus
dodo
dora
dreams
egg
empty
enter
eye
eyes
fatale
femme
fiasco
find
fine
finite
fixed
flimflam
fractal
fractals
full
gave
good
ground
hand
hard
heart
heaven
hit
hold
home
ideas
imaginary
infinite
infinitely
infinity
kid
knew
lay
lightning
line
long
longer
looked
lot
magnify
man
manny
matter
microscope
mitts
mmm
mook
mugshot
muse
music
night
number
numbers
objects
original
overindulgent
pay
peaks
perimeter
perimeters
picture
piece
pinch
pinches
platonic
played
ponder
pretty
private
quarter
remaining
repetition
riddle
riddles
rising
rock
romeo
satisfied
segments
shape
shapes
show
side
sides
size
smaller
smooth
snip
spread
stolen
straight
strange
stuck
stuff
sum
surprise
talk
thought
threes
told
triangle
triangles
true
ugh
uncontrollably
volume
wanted
work
zoom