No, that is not a typo. It’s a reference to a classic optical illusion. You probably have seen it—a triangle that contains three lines. The first line is “Paris.” The second line is “in the.” The last line is “the Spring.” People will often read it as “Paris in the Spring,” not the correct “Paris in the the Spring.”

I know, I know … This thought immediately pops into your head: “But it’s obvious that the word ‘the’ is repeated.”

And you wouldn’t be wrong.

Until you look at the picture of the triangle with the words in it.

Why is that?

Believe it or not, there’s a scientific explanation for this. It comes from vision science, and it’s called a “saccade.” This term refers to what happens when both eyes move simultaneously in Continue Reading “Lafayette In The The Spring”