The Voynich Ninja

(18-08-2017, 10:45 PM)VViews Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Hi Torsten,
to your post above, how would we know a Voynich feature is unique, without first carrying out an extensive survey to make sure nothing else is comparable?
I agree this leads us to a lot of dead ends, and I understand it may seem ineffective, but how else can we be sure of the uniqueness of any Voynich feature?
"Unknown" is after all a relative notion. What may seem unique to me because I don't know of anything comparable, can be well-known or familiar to someone with a different background or skill set.
IMO this makes nickpelling's point about "concerted attacks" the most promising avenue, and the collaborative potential of a forum like this one offers a great platform for such cooperation.

For researching a feature of the VMS it is not necessary to know if this feature is unique or not. What is important is that you research something that is typical for the VMS. You can for instance ask yourself how the glyphs of the VMS are used or if the design of a glyph says something about its usage. In a similar way you can try to analyze patterns typical for a word, a single page or a section of the VMS. Then you can compare the patterns found for different words, pages or the sections with each other. This way you might find out what all the words, pages or sections have in common and where they differ. This way you have the chance to describe features which are characteristic for the VMS. Then you can use this features to compare the VMS with something else. Only this way you would compare features typical for the VMS. If you do otherwise you will probably search for patterns in the VMS which are not there or which are not characteristic for the VMS.

Quick question: has anybody here ever read about the Combinatorial Method of Massimo Pallottino? Theoretically, he's my absolute hero for his work on Etruscan and I believe that his method could be really helpful for several areas of research on the Voynich manuscript.

Hmm, seems like Etruscan studies have quite some things in common with Voynich studies. 

Quote:While mainstream specialists in Etruscology have long since abandoned the etymological method in favour of the slow, rigorous work of the combinatorial method, the etymological method is still popular with amateurs and cranks wishing to prove a relationship between ancient texts and their favourite language.

The combinatorial method seems perfect for Etruscan, but the first stage already causes significant problems for the Voynich. Archaeological-antiquarian analysis.

• We cannot perform any (additional) tests on the artefact.
  
• There is no context at all. We know it was moved into Prague, at which time the ties to its origin had long been severed.
  
• We don't know at all where it was made.
  
• Manuscripts are not necessarily culturally and linguistically consistent or homogenous.
  

But I guess the morphological analysis would be the crucial stage. Do you have a concrete idea how this could help with the VM?
What bothers me is that Voynichese seems, at a glance, mostly analytical since words are short. But candidates for common non-lexical words are rare.

Torsten,
you said:
"The VMS has many unique features.... It would be probably much more effective if you would research the unique features of the VMS. "
And then:
"For researching a feature of the VMS it is not necessary to know if this feature is unique or not. *

Those two statements are contradictory and now this just doesn't make sense to me, sorry.

Hi Koen, I am sorry, but I disagree with most of your statements:

Quote:We cannot perform any (additional) tests on the artefact.

The artifact still exists. Of course (thanks god) bloggers are not allowed to perform tests on it, but scientists can.

Quote:There is no context at all. We know it was moved into Prague, at which time the ties to its origin had long been severed.

The illustrations provide a huge quantity of contextual information (the labelled illustrations in particular). Do you believe the illustrations to be completely unrelated with the text? What do you think "context" means?

Quote:We don't know at all where it was made.

We know quite exactly when it was made and we have a number of stylistic hints to where it was made. We clearly don't know exactly where it was made, but antiquarian-archaeological analysis is the kind of activity that can tell us more about this (see Panofsky, Toresella, Sniezynska-Stolot, Touwaide). Do you think it likely that the ms was not made in Europe? Any evidence?

Quote:Manuscripts are not necessarily culturally and linguistically consistent or homogenous.

Do you have reasons to be believe that the different sections of the ms are written in different languages? Of course, everything is possible, but the most interesting possibilities are those that are supported by some kind of evidence. Any examples of linguistically inconsistent manuscripts that could parallel the VMS?

Hi Marco

I, in turn, disagree with your objections.

1) Emma was talking about following this method ourselves, so the fact that we don't have access to the artefact is a very real hindrance. Of course I do agree that we should be denied access to testing the VM at all costs . But the limitation remains.

2) There is still significant disagreement about the illustrations, and what is great about the approach people like Emma favor is that they circumvent this problem by studying the language-as-language. But yes, I personally think success will lie in a label-and-image-based approach. Still, this is much, much more complex in the VM than with, say, an inscription found in a nobleman's tomb. 

3) We know almost nothing about where the manuscript was made. Its contents are almost irrelevant to its place of production, since sources travel as well. Even within Europe, there would be a huge difference if it was made in Germany, England, Northern Italy, Sicily or Spain. And even if we knew the country, we still know nothing about the context. Some people seem to favor a lonely scribe in a mountain cabin, while others think of a monastic setting or a "secular" workshop. 

Yes, there are indications, but this is again infinitely more complex than with an Etruscan inscription found in situ. I'm sure there are complex cases there as well, but there are plenty of inscriptions where the context is mostly clear.

Panofsky seems to have changed his mind about the manuscript based on the conviction that one of the plants was a sunflower and a German reading of the Mus Del marginalia. I have severe doubts about the sunflower, and German marginalia means that the manuscript passed through German speaking hands. His initial impression was a multi-cultural Spanish context.

And Touwaide and Toresella have done wonderful work in their own areas, but their statements about the VM have been vague, very careful or even in the negative about it belonging to known traditions. Do you really think they have provided sufficient argumentation to say that the VM has been made in x location?

(19-08-2017, 09:02 AM)VViews Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Torsten,
you said:
"The VMS has many unique features.... It would be probably much more effective if you would research the unique features of the VMS. "
And then:
"For researching a feature of the VMS it is not necessary to know if this feature is unique or not. *

Those two statements are contradictory and now this just doesn't make sense to me, sorry.

Instead of "It would be probably much more effective if you would research the unique features of the VMS." I should have written "It would be probably much more effective if you would research features that are characteristic for the VMS."

My point is that you have to describe the VMS as it is. For doing so it doesn't matter if a feature is unique or if it can be found somewhere else. The feature exists. This is all we need to know to research it.

(19-08-2017, 10:18 AM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Hi Marco

I, in turn, disagree with your objections.

1) Emma was talking about following this method ourselves, so the fact that we don't have access to the artefact is a very real hindrance. Of course I do agree that we should be denied access to testing the VM at all costs . But the limitation remains.

So you seriously believe you have the competence to perform tests on a XV Century manuscript yourself.  Have you received a specific training or do you think that anyone can perform meaningful tests on artifacts? Exactly, how does your impossibility to perform tests on the ms hinders the research of the Voynich community? Don't you think it could be better to see the research community as something in which the roles of people depend on their competence, leaving tests to those with a specific training and blogs to amateurs?

(19-08-2017, 10:18 AM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.2) There is still significant disagreement about the illustrations, and what is great about the approach people like Emma favor is that they circumvent this problem by studying the language-as-language. But yes, I personally think success will lie in a label-and-image-based approach. Still, this is much, much more complex in the VM than with, say, an inscription found in a nobleman's tomb. 

Disagreement doesn't make things nonexistent. Many amateurs disagree with Pallottino and are still at work on their own Etruscan theories: their disagreement doesn't make the results of scholars disappear. 
Much work can be done on the text only, but it's good to know that the visual context allows us to check that proposed readings are consistent with it. This is not a personal view, but the practice of contextual analysis.
You previously wrote that “There is no context at all”. But the context is there and its existence doesn't depend on the current state of Emma's research.

(19-08-2017, 10:18 AM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.3) We know almost nothing about where the manuscript was made. Its contents are almost irrelevant. Even within Europe, there would be a huge difference if it was made in Germany, England, Northern Italy, Sicily or Spain. And even if we knew the country, we still know nothing about the context. Some people seem to favor a lonely scribe in a mountain cabin, while others think of a monastic setting or a "secular" workshop. 

Yes, there are indications, but this is again infinitely more complex than with an Etruscan inscription found in situ. I'm sure there are complex cases there as well, but there are plenty of inscriptions where the context is mostly clear.

Panofsky seems to have changed his mind about the manuscript based on the conviction that one of the plants was a sunflower and a German reading of the Mus Del marginalia. I have severe doubts about the sunflower, and German marginalia means that the manuscript passed through German speaking hands. His initial impression was a multi-cultural Spanish context.

And Touwaide and Toresella have done wonderful work in their own areas, but their statements about the VM have been vague, very careful or even in the negative about it belonging to known traditions. Do you really think they have provided sufficient argumentation to say that the VM has been made in x location?

Yes, I do believe in the value of this kind of antiquarian analysis. The identification of specific German and Italian elements is the result of the hard work of researchers to whom I am grateful. Even if we don't have a specific location, I don't believe their work is “almost nothing”. But then I also don't believe I can make meaningful physical tests on ancient artifacts nor that I can read inscriptions in pre-medieval tombs. I guess my awareness of my own limits makes it easier for me to appreciate advancements due to others.

Marco

Your tone is polite but I find your way of arguing (here) somewhat unfair. I started my post by saying "Of course I do agree that we should be denied access to testing the VM at all costs". This should make it clear to you that I do not want to test the VM myself. How would I do this without proper knowledge and material?

The fact that we are not in a position (not allowed and not able) to test the manuscript is a limitation we have to deal with. Archaeologists studying Etruscan artifacts just have much more concrete information about the origin of the object than we do, and their position (as professionals) might allow them to commission tests in some cases.

Yet your reply is drenched in the strawman argument that I want to test the VM myself - it's rather difficult to argue about the matter at hand in this way.

(19-08-2017, 12:06 PM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Marco

Your tone is polite but I find your way of arguing (here) somewhat unfair. I started my post by saying "Of course I do agree that we should be denied access to testing the VM at all costs". This should make it clear to you that I do not want to test the VM myself. How would I do this without proper knowledge and material?

The fact that we are not in a position (not allowed and not able) to test the manuscript is a limitation we have to deal with. Archaeologists studying Etruscan artifacts just have much more concrete information about the origin of the object than we do, and their position (as professionals) might allow them to commission tests in some cases.

Yet your reply is drenched in the strawman argument that I want to test the VM myself - it's rather difficult to argue about the matter at hand in this way.

You wrote "the fact that we don't have access to the artefact is a very real hindrance"
Please detail how this hinders the research community.