I have recently created a program with which you can spell any word (that is possible) using the symbols of the periodic table of the elements. For example, Beren (the name of this website) would be Beryllium, Rhenium, Nitrogen, or Be Re N. If you want a full periodic table, I recommend this one. Here is the demo:
See the Pen Periodic Table Spelling Chemistry by BERENGENITA (@berengenita) on CodePen.light
I also used this algorithm to analyze how many words in English and Spanish can be spelled using this method. For that, I downloaded a frequency list of words for each language1, curated it into a more computer-friendly format and made a program that read through it counting how many words are possible and how many are not (this code is available on GitHub).
However, not all words are used equally2, so I made the program count which words are possible taking into account each one’s frequency at the same time. To put it simply, if only words spelled using chemical symbols existed, and we erased all prohibited words, the first metric (without frequency) counts which percentage of the words in the dictionary would be left while the second (with frequency) counts which percentage of the text in the books would still exist in a library. The results were the following:
I do not know why these results are so similar. I can try to guess that it is because character combinations are about as likely in each language and that is what I am measuring, but I am not very sure. If you know or have another guess, please contact me.
