A physical definition of Dyslexia and the discovery of Vitusymmetry,  the sibling property of Dyslexia

Ulrich König and Helge König

Summary

At the age of six Helge described his problems with reading and writing as follows. He drew his name figuratively and as a mirror image next to each other and above it he filled a bubble with characters. An analysis showed that all the characters were created by symmetrical transformations of the letters of his name. This enabled a new, physical based definition of dyslexia to be made. Dyslexia is the result of unconscious, random transformations of symmetry.

If there are unconscious, random symmetry transformations, based on the laws of physics there must also be their counterpart, namely conscious, planned symmetry transformations.

Helge also displayed this disposition as a child. We gave this sibling property to Dyslexia the name Vitusymmetry.

It turns out that vitusymmetry is at least as common as dyslexia.

Dyslexics are mainly men. Vitusymmetrics are mainly women.

Today, Helge is no longer dyslexic or vitusymmetric.

Preliminary remarks

To deal successful with a scientific problem it is important to identify the problem correctly and describe it correctly. If a description or definition is seen to be insufficient, new descriptions have to be attempted.

This also applies to dyslexia.

Dyslexia was thus described in 1988 and this applies almost unchanged to this day.

• Dyslexia is a pronounced and severe disorder in learning to read or
• Dyslexia is a defined disorder when learning written language, which cannot be explained by a general impairment of general mental development or
• Dyslexia is a problem of perception, a coding problem, etc.

With descriptions like these a purposeful approach to research is very difficult.

Just six weeks after my son Helge (born in 1981) started school, I asked his teacher whether he could be dyslexic. Her answer was no as he was enrolled in the school too early. As the school psychologist remarked – he was not responsible for the first two years at school. There was no specific support by the school, nor was there any qualified external support yet.

But help was urgently needed…

This is why I decided, as a chemist with years of experience in research, to deal with the issue of dyslexia myself. This included becoming a member of the Dyslexia Association and helping along with my wife and others to form a dyslexia working group in the Mannheim-Heidelberg area, attending conferences, helping to educate children (always unpaid), having discussions with affected parents and children, giving lectures and interviews, a private visit to an authority of the Rhineland-Palatinate state government due to a dyslexia-related ruling, on the occasion of a film about Helge and myself by BASF-TV and offering items for publication, unfortunately always without success.

Above all, it meant “listening” to my son.

According to Martin Luther (in his Open Letter on Translating of 1530): “…Rather we must ask the mother in the home, the children on the street, the common man in the marketplace. We must be guided by their language, by the way they speak and do our translating accordingly…”

Helge’s description of his problems (dyslexia)

On August 1, 1988 my son Helge wrote down his first name – Helge. Figuratively and as a mirror image. Only the G was not a mirror image. The G (and the symmetrical 6 and 9) was what we had practiced very intensively before that. Helge was six years old at the time (born September 1, 1981).

H. tapped his name (figurative and mirror image) and said, “That’s my problem.”

Then he tapped the bubble and commented, “That’s what it looks like in my head.”

“That’s why it looks like in my head”

“That’s my problem”

An examination of the characters in the bubble showed that they were obviously created by visual symmetry transformations from the letters of the name Helge.

The possible symmetry transformations

Mirrored L, rotation around the vertical axis and doubling

Rotation of “G = 6” and similarity

Rotation of “G = 6” around the horizontal axis and break in symmetry

Reflection of the L and doubling, rotation around the horizontal axis and break in symmetry

Helge’s problem was obviously a result of unconscious, random symmetry transformations (mirroring, rotation, doubling).

This is a new definition of dyslexia, which allows for an important conclusion. Based on the laws of physics, there must be a disposition, which is an addition to the unconscious mind, a disposition that is based on conscious, planned symmetry transformations. A disposition that has to be at least as common as dyslexia and can be understood as a counterpart and complement to dyslexia.

H. also experienced and described this conscious, symmetrical thinking. We called his ability vitusymmetry.

That was in the 1990s.

It is absolutely incredible that the “professionals” have not managed to discover vitusymmetry to this day!

Because it also explains why the genetic origin of dyslexia has only been identified up to 50%. Vitusymmetry as its affiliated attribute has simply always been overlooked.

Helge describes his amazing abilities (vitusymmetry)

Age 7
In the car in Mannheim, I asked H. if he could identify a road sign still way ahead in the distance. I was unable to. His answer was, “Wait, I have to zoom onto it.” Then he described the road sign to us.

Age 10
H. was 10 years old when we found out that he can consciously swap colors in his mind’s eye.

We had five numbered cubes. Each one was a different color. The numbers were black dots. I placed two cubes in such a way that the 1 was on top in each case. One cube was white, the other yellow. About five feet away there was a chessboard. I asked H. “Can you swap the cubes in your mind’s eye”. His answer was, “Yes, I put the ones on the chessboard and swapped them there.” Before swapping them, H. imagined the white 1 on a white space, the yellow cube on a black space (July 28, 1992).

In another test I presented some glued colored squares to H. There were five colors. The colored squares were each three quarters of an inch in size.

            

H. was able to have the colors move in steps from left to right with ease, and back again. He was even able to specify the effort he required to swap the colors.

In another test I presented pairs of colors to H. Always red on one side and next to it either green, blue, yellow and black. In one series of tests red was always on the left, in the other red was always on the right.

H. expressed the effort to swap in terms of school grades from 1+ to 6-. From about 10 measurements an average value was determined. We measured on three different days. One time, red was always on the left, the next day always on the right.

To improve our understanding of this, the average values of the school grades were converted into relative numbers of 1–10. These relative numbers, referred to as color swap effort, were presented graphically for the difference of wavelengths minus the other color.

Color swap curve

 

The curve is reminiscent of those, which are familiar from the human sense of hearing, for example. With hearing the measured sound is also greater than what is perceived.

Age 11 (September 10, 1992)
H. is able to merge the two Ms in his mind’s eye into one single M.

M M   →   M

Age 12 (March 3, 1994)
H. reported that he could enlarge or reduce a square on a sheet of paper at will or could change its angle or turn it into several squares. He could also view the squares or the paper spatially. Furthermore, he could set fire to the paper or the square without them burning. The things he could do with squares would not even fit on a disk.

Age 12 (April 23, 1994)

H. wrote an essay at school and then said he had written it with one half of his brain and thought about how it would continue with the other half, “but only for a short time.”

Age 13
Another time, H. turned down the announcer on the radio very low. I could not understand anything. When I asked whether he could understand the announcer, he replied, “Of course, I’m simply making the sound louder.”

Age 13
In his mind’s eye / ear H. is aware of everything consciously that happens to a dyslexic person unconsciously. For example, doubling letters, shortening letters, tilting letters, turning, enlarging and reducing them.

Age 16
H. also had excellent vision in the dark. Apparently, he could switch on a kind of low light amplifier as required.

Age 17 (March 2, 1998).

• H. can no longer flip an image (church) by 90°.
• He can no longer transpose blue and red.
• He can no longer transpose a rectangle without an inserted cross and a rectangle with an inserted cross.

Helge is no longer vitusymmetric. I hope he is no longer dyslexic either.

It soon became clear that more women than men have this previously unknown ability and they are to be found especially in the nursing and medical professions.

I usually recognized the women by their clothing. They prefer blue and black. The question of whether their current color of clothing was their favorite color was always a good way to start a conversation. Sometimes I heard them say, “at last someone understands me.”

I submit that I was able to conduct interviews and tests with more than 100 individuals over the years. The male vitusymmetrics I spoke to were mostly youths.

Over time, I have learned that approximately 5–8% of all women are vitusymmetric. But only 2–3% of dyslexics are females. Among men the reverse is true. It is possible that both dispositions do not occur in adults simultaneously.

Appendix

Vitusymmetric abilities must have been vitally important for our early ancestors. Some of these abilities are summarized here. These findings are the result of a survey of about 600, mostly female vitusymmetrics.

Seeing in the mind’s eye

• Enlarging a small object, whether nearby or faraway (usually works better with one eye).
• Adjusting a blurred image to bring it into focus.
• Seeing a close and distant image in sharp focus simultaneously.
• Changing the color of an observed object to create a better contrast.
• Low-level light amplification at night.
• Turning a gray object into a colored one in the dark (usually works better with one eye). Usually easiest to do with blue.

Hearing in the mind’s ear

• Perceiving and making sense of two or more conversations / sounds simultaneously.
• Amplifying low-level sound.
• Turning down a loud volume.

Vitusymmetry  Survey

 

Two discoveries have been made

 

• A new definition of dyslexia and

• The discovery of vitusymmetry, the affiliated attribute of dyslexia

• Dyslexia is unconscious, random symmetrical thinking. When reading and writing.

• Vitusymmetry is conscious, projectable, planned, symmetrical thinking. In the mind’s eye, also when reading and writing. Vitusymmetry is the counterpart of dyslexia.

 

Concluding remarks

This work is a summary. The authors can provide further information about dyslexia and vitusymmetry.

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