The Voynich Ninja

While I can certainly see where you are going with your diagram, and have sympathy with the idea of the script being systematic, I'm concerned that you're perceiving relationship based on appearance rather than function. Yes, appearance potentially matters (I certainly think it does), but if we're going to propose that the script was designed then we must believe in some underlying design philosophy. Was the idea simply to make some glyphs appear similar, or to make them appear similar because they work in a similar way.

I believe that the Voynich script could be featural, or have a featural aspect, but that requires a marriage of appearance and function.

For example, how would you describe the functional relationship between [y] and [l]?

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It is as JKP explains it. It's the connections where you have to pay attention.
And they are always the same connections.
Now you have to ask yourself how complicated can a key be if I have to explain it to other people, etc. Davis should follow, there are possibly 5 people involved.
If I look at the attachments of a possible "P".
What does it look like in a combination ? Words with " fp, lp ,cp, np, etc are more than unlikely.
But how does it look in combination with vowels ?  "ap,ep,ip, etc.
First and foremost, it must be explainable. Whether it is right or wrong remains to be seen.

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I am also concerned about giving too much weight to appearance 'by itself'.

Looking at the Latin alphabet may help to underline this:
Obviously the letters "O" and "Q" appear very similar, and so to "E" and "F", but they have nothing to do with each other. A "B" is not two "D"s on top of each other, etc.

However, there is a tendency in Voynichese for similar shapes to have similar contexts, and that is the part that should matter.
Furthermore, these similar contexts are only similar 'to a point', and there are clear systematic differences. Some of these systematic differences hold throughout the MS, but others depend on the Currier language.

True.

It's even funnier with lower case letters.
pbdqol, lft and old S and Latin "sh"

Thanks everyone! As always, it's really appreciated you taking the time to consider and reply.

And in all honesty, I am as dubious as anyone as to where I am going with this chart.

Of course, as others have pointed out, there may not necessarily be any connection between the shape of the glyphs and their function.  I love ReneZ's example regarding the English alphabet, and totally agree.  Just because a 'b' and 'd' look similar in the latin alphabet, and just have a curve on the other side of their vertical stick, doesn't mean the characters are connected.

Which leads me to 2 conclusions.  Either;
1) The shapes just happen to look similar.  There is no connection between the pairs - the similarity just made it easier for the scribe to invent/write out the language.
2) There IS a connection, but it is not a connection we can identify by looking at the glyph position in the vords, in relationship to their twins.  (Ie, EVA r and EVA s are indeed connected, but their connection is determined by something else as opposed to their interaction with other glyphs in the script.)

Let me give a couple of examples of what I mean by the latter, with two (easily debunked!) theories.
Theory 1  - the text is a natural language, where most glyphs represent both a consonant and vowel.
In Japanese, for example, the language can be written out in a text called Hirigana, where most of the letters (or glyphs) has a consonant followed by vowel sound.  These are grouped into tables, eg there is one table where the characters read Ka, Sa, Ta, and Ha (written with one letter, or glyph).  However, by adding a symbol which looks like a speech mark (") to these, they change their reading to Ga, Za, Da, and Ba.  One of these is changeable again by a little circle on the letter, making it Pa.  Maybe the Voynich is working off a similar pattern.  Maybe the curve root represents vowel A sound only, and everything that is added to that vowel by means of a modifier, becomes a consonant starter.  The line root, on the other hand, could be a vowel E sound, after which, every modifier added changes the E sound by adding the same Consonant as it did to the A.  That way, there would be a connection with gylphs and their modifiers, but this would not determine their position within a vord.  (It could also explain why the gallows sometimes appear in the middle of Benches.  If the gallows represent a single consonant, say P, T, or K, and the benches represent a sound such as SA, then the combination with the gallows at the centre become SPA, STA, and SKA.... very pronouncable.)

Do I believe the voynich is Japanese? Course not.  Do I believe in the Consonant/Vowel system I described above.  Absolutely NO.  The above doesn't work.  For one, there aren't enough glyphs to make the amount of combinations you'd need to flesh out the language, and if we were to say that the curve root and the line root were our A and E vowels... we'd only have two vowel sounds in our language!

Theory 2 - the text is a cypher.  In this theory, we could put it forward that, maybe each variation on the character gives us a new Value for that character.  Let's say... the curve root (eva E) equals 1, and the line root (eva i) equals 1 as well, but for a different list (maybe X and Y axis...?).  Now, for every change or modifier we add to these characters, the value changes to 2, 3 and 4, with their twins having the same value. Then we plot the X values and Y values on a graph, and hey presto, we get an answer to the code!

Do I believe this?  No.  again, if it were that simple, a computer would have cracked the puzzle.  Besides, X and Y axis, as far as I know, were invented long after the VMS

BUT my point in writing out these crazy, silly theories is to make one vital point...  JUST BECAUSE we can't see any connection with the twins I have laid out in my graph, doesn't necessarily mean that one does not exist. These are two examples of how, very easily, a connection can be made between the shapes, and they CAN have something in common, without having ANYTHING in common whatsoever in the context or position within a vord.  And that was my point.

We just need to figure out where the connection IS.

Which, of course, as far as I can see, is ruddy impossible.  And the chances are JUST as high, if not more so, that the shape of the glyphs is utterly meaningless anyway.

Ah... don't you love the Voynich.

It might be worth, rather than trying to explain the whole script as having a single system, laying out the functional relationships between individual pairs. Some relationships may be strong, others may not exist. Those relationships which are strong can then become a base of evidence to build a more informed theory about the script as a whole.

You could build a "functional similarity index" which rates each glyph against another according to how similar they behaved within words. The index could be built on factors such as the glyphs which occur before and after, or whether replacement of one glyph with another results in a valid word, or a number of other measures. This could be displayed as a map/digram showing differing levels of similarity to compare with the graphical evidence, allowing revision of your theory. (This has, in fact, been done before. But revisiting the idea is worthwhile if it's a genuine attempt at collecting new insights.)

(By the way, I think that looking at the design of the script and the way the glyphs work and interact in the text is a very useful line of research. Please don't take anything I say as discouraging. Only that it's better to be able to say one small thing securely than lots of big things uncertainly.)

Thanks again Emma, and don't worry, I didn't take anything as discouraging.  (Well, any more than I've already been discouraging myself at least!) 

I suppose the next step is to go through the entire text vord by vord and see if I can figure out how to make any sense of this graph. 

I probably won't get anywhere, as I have my own doubts about my chart.  But I always think when it comes to the Voynich - it's better to try something daft that nobody's tried before, than to try something clever that many have tried already.

Right... time to stare at some glyphs...

Just for a reference, we have an old thread on roughly the same subject here: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.