Why the longest English word is PAPAL and SPA is the pointiest.

Here are my files with all the distances and angles on a keyboard.

Thanks to everyone who made those ridiculous Mathematics He Wrote opening titles possible. The folder was crafted by Lisa Mathers, the SUM theme was one again remixed by Howard Carter and the whole thing was directed by Alex Genn-Bash. I did all my own typing.

CORRECTIONS:
- Urg, at 05:46 Pythagoras is accidentally spelled as “Pythagorus”. That’s not a joke; legit mistake. I’ve made a real uss of myself.
- At 09:57 I say PAPAL averages 13.1cm "per journey" when I should have said "per letter". Consider this my confession.
- At 3:40 I say "So the top 4 rows, now including the letters" but I meant “now including the digits". But what are digits if not fancy letters? Spotted by Trimutius.
- Let me know if you spot any other mistakes!

And here are most of the words mentioned in this video:

MINIMUM (distance = 248.0mm, angle = 77.4°)
DICHLORODIPHENYLTRICHLOROETHANE (distance = 2119.5mm, angle = 1548.0°)
ANTIDISESTABLISHMENTARIANISM (distance = 2031.8mm, angle = 1229.3°)
SUPERINCOMPREHENSIBLENESS (distance = 1665.5mm, angle = 1090.4°)
PALAPALA (distance = 1112.9mm, angle = 19.6°)
PAPAL (distance = 655.7mm, angle = 6.5°)
PAPA (distance = 503.3mm, angle = 0.0°)
AS (distance = 19.1mm, angle = 0.0°)
ASS (distance = 19.1mm, angle = 0.0°)
POO (distance = 19.1mm, angle = 0.0°)
POOP (distance = 38.1mm, angle = 0.0°)
DEESS (distance = 43.4mm, angle = 50.9°)
WEEDS (distance = 57.7mm, angle = 180.0°)
WEEWEE (distance = 57.2mm, angle = 0.0°)
WEEWEED (distance = 76.8mm, angle = 104.0°)
DISMANTLEMENT (distance = 1124.2mm, angle = 143.3°)
SPA (distance = 316.6mm, angle = 0.8°)
FUZZ (distance = 162.8mm, angle = 0.9°)
GAZOGENE (distance = 523.5mm, angle = 310.3°)
SCHIZOGONY (distance = 638.2mm, angle = 407.0°)
WAYZGOOSE (distance = 502.8mm, angle = 294.0°)
OUTREACH (distance = 255.3mm, angle = 878.2°)
ETHMOIDS (distance = 278.4mm, angle = 798.9°)
NONMISCHIEVOUSNESS (distance = 965.9mm, angle = 1068.5°)
NONSUBSTITUTIONARY (distance = 989.4mm, angle = 1038.4°)

Filming and editing by Alex Genn-Bash
Props by Lisa Mathers
Geogebra by Sam Hartburn
Music by Howard Carter
Design by Simon Wright and Adam Robinson
All typing by Matt Parker

MATT PARKER: Stand-up Mathematician

[alkalinekats]

"If you accept the definition that a word as some letters, surrounded by a gap, then xnopyt, hrrkrkrkrwpfrbrbrbrlablblblblblblwhitoo'ap, are all words" ~Tom Scott

[TheHookUp]

I'm pretty sure Matt is as close as we have to a modern day Greek "philosopher"... an extremely bright person who just sits around and thinks about stuff all day.

[danielhuneke]

"If you're goin' up and down, you're in hypotenuse town." Is probably the nerdiest phrase I've ever heard.

[skarphld]

Linguist by training + recreational math hobbyist + circular fingerpoke typing enthusiast = delighted fan. Keep up the good (?) work!

[freelancer]

This is a lot of research into something that ultimately doesn't really matter all that much. And I appreciate every second of it!

[rubenlarochelle]

That "Mathematics, he wrote" intro was both the funniest look I could have ever imagined Matt having and the most sublime version of the Stand-up Maths theme I've heard so far.

[agnarrenolen]

This has an important application in spell checking, as most typing errors comes from missing a key and press one adjacent to it. So if you misspell a word, your spell checker should suggest the word with the closest “distance” to it.

[frogjmon]

Crazy idea, run a novel through your typing distance program. I want to know how far an author had to move their fingers to type a book, next level would be a book series (go all in with wheel of time haha)

[juriaanv]

Fun fact: The word spa originated from the Belgian village Spa, renowned for its mineral springs. Unfortunately the inhabitants in Spa can't enjoy how pointy the word is because the AZERTY key layout is used there.

[dirkh]

Should have got Tom Scott in for this classy linguistics fun

[bwn]

You may find it interesting that the word "minimum" is also one of the most favoured practice words in calligraphy for lowercase characters.

[ReasonableSwampMonster]

It’s just great that such a large number of the shortest words are so silly

[MCLooyverse]

I love how any mathematics involving spelling just devolves into "This string has this property. Yes, apparently it is a word. No, I've never heard of it either.".

[goatmeal]

Spoiler: this video features the debut of the "Parker spelling" of Pythagoras at 5:45!

[visusdeiveri]

14:37 “Deess” is an obsolete word meaning goddess.

Deo/Deus being masculine for god, Deess being feminine for goddess, Deity being neutral.

The pronunciation would have been more like DAY-ESS, rather than DEE-S.

[danyael]

07:30 - I'm german, i've had my share of compound nouns. Non-technical, technical, you name it. The longest german words aren't even that uncommon in everyday speech.
And btw, "minimum" is also very satisfying to write by hand imo.

[Kyanzes]

"See, everyday use of Pythagorus!"
"Hmm, interesting, and what is this everyday use?"
"Putting together a logic to measure distance travelled between keyboard keys..."
"I see. Could happen to anyone, any day."

[KleenerBro]

"But Mr. Parker, what is the point of learning this stuff about vectors? It's totally useless in the real world!"
"You could calculate the pointiest words on a keyboard."
"Thanks, Mr. Parker! Now suddenly math is total fun for me."

[LucyXuCovers]

Huh this is actually really interesting as someone who types on their phone with the 'swipe' method, the intended audience for those distance calculations haha

[Theoreticaly]

I'd like to add a few words for everyone's consideration: DREAD, alternatively READ. Has a wonderful little circle motion. Hours of fun. WARD is another good one with an easy but satisfying one-hand motion. MINIMUM is still really very good, though; definitely hard to beat that one.