In the naive ASCII encoding we have used in Initial Experiments with Text Alignment 10.3.17 characters that are close in "literature space" are not necessarily close in "ASCII space". Maybe we need to consider encodings that ensure say corresponding upper and lower case letters are closer together etc. .

Background Reading

The Genetic Code is well known to be an error minimizing code -- possibly a Gray Code.

• The case for an error minimizing standard genetic code. Freeland SJ, Wu T, Keulmann N. Orig Life Evol Biosph. 2003 Oct;33(4-5):457-77.
• Evolution Encoded, Freeland, S.J. & Hurst, L. (2004). Scientific American 290:84-91. Nice review.
• Language Evolution in Humans and Ancient Microbes: ... Freeland and Ilardo 2011