B

Five images: the same swollen letterforms as Four — e a B n o — from perfectly legible to maximally destroyed. A different machine was shown each one, twenty times over, and asked to transcribe any text it could see. Shown an unrelated image instead, it correctly reports it can't read any text. Shown this row of five letters, at any stroke width, including the one where all five are perfectly legible, it reports exactly one of them.

Below is every reply, unedited, grouped by image. There are 100. They are all the same word.

Five letterforms, stroke 0 of the sweep.

stroke 0 · 20 readings

B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B

Five letterforms, stroke 30 of the sweep.

stroke 30 · 20 readings

B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B

Five letterforms, stroke 42 of the sweep.

stroke 42 · 20 readings

B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B

Five letterforms, stroke 54 of the sweep.

stroke 54 · 20 readings

B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B

Five letterforms, stroke 66 of the sweep.

stroke 66 · 20 readings

B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B B