The problem with the Voynich is that it makes us feel like we are being proper scientists, finding evidence that confirms our theories. This phenomenon is so common in human reasoning in general that it gets its own name: confirmation bias.
In Voynich research, this happens over and over and over again to all kinds of people. Distinguished botanists who believe the plants are American and put their credibility on the line to pursue this idea. Professor Romaine Newbold, who thought the actual code was to be found in cracks within the letters. A whole series of well-meaning, intelligent and dedicated people, who insist the language in the MS is Turkic or Slovenian or Latin or you name it.
None of these people are crazy or dumb. They are/were all intelligent people who genuinely believe they are following proper scientific methods. But they aren't. They are all victims of the manuscript's huge confirmation bias trap. You are too. I have been at several points. Probably everyone on the forum has been at one point or another...
I am human. Guilty as charged. But believe me, when I started investigating the Voynich Manuscript, I did NOT want to see it as any kind of "sex manual". I liked the idea that many people presented that the Voynich Manuscript was created as a 15th century health manual for women. That would be very unexpected and very nice to find. It didn't happen.
When I started investigating the Voynich Manuscript, I tried to approach it with an open mind. As I stated before, my first impression of any meaning in the illustrations was the Ensoulment on page Quire 13 You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view. with the star-soul entering the sleeping woman.
You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
From there it was a short step to seeing all the star images as souls. I then discovered that Ernest A. Lillie had presented that idea 20 years ago. This link should download a copy of Lillie's paper if you click it:
You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
I liked the idea that Earnest Lillie presented for a connection between the Voynich Manuscript and Dante's Divine Comedy. It has nymphs and stars:
You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
"Dante is submerged in the water, and enters the dance of the four women, who tell Dante that they were nymphs when here, and stars in the sky."
I tried very hard to see the Rosettes page as Dante's Nine Spheres of Heaven. That was what I wanted to see but I was not able to make a match between Dante's Nine Spheres and the nine Rosettes of the Voynich Manuscript. I had no choice but to toss out that idea and find a new idea.
I would love to know where Ernest A. Lillie is today. I hope he is still living.
Again, I recognize what you describe from my own experience 8 years ago when I started studying the manuscript. My first ideas about Q13 related to distillation and similar processes. I didn't really see this working out though, so I ended up switching to another theory. This idea that I ditched my initial impulses in favor of something I would not immediately relate to reinforced my feelings that my secondary theories had to be right.
...but the process is still one propelled by confirmation bias. Aspects that confirm the theory are accepted and reinforce the idea, while everything else is disregarded. It does not matter how likely we were to come up with this theory, or how many theories we've had before. Confirmation bias is what drives most Voynich theories, and it is the reason why so many intelligent people (again, including myself at some point) are fooled into believing they have the solution.
Aside from a time machine or a séance, we are never going to be able to ask the creators of the manuscript what they were thinking. What approach do you recommend should be taken?
(18-03-2024, 03:21 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.My first ideas about Q13 related to distillation and similar processes.
@Koen: Just as an aside, I still get a lot out of this view today.
(18-03-2024, 04:50 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (18-03-2024, 03:21 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.My first ideas about Q13 related to distillation and similar processes.
@Koen: Just as an aside, I still get a lot out of this view today.
Can you explain what you mean by "get a lot out of"? Are you saying that you still think that Quire 13 is about the distillation of something? If so, can you elaborate? Which elements in which illustrations? What do you think is being distilled?
(18-03-2024, 05:29 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (18-03-2024, 05:13 PM)pjburkshire Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Can you explain what you mean by "get a lot out of"? Are you saying that you still think that Quire 13 is about the distillation of something? If so, can you elaborate? Which elements in which illustrations? What do you think is being distilled?
(offtopic)
In order not to go too much offtopic, here is a short note:
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
I agree with the 1 comment "the images do not connect":
D.O'Donovan. said...
The 'alchemical' theory has been around for a century and more, so it might be a good idea to see why it has never gone anywhere and why speciaists in the history of western Europe's alchemy and alchemical imagery uniformly reject the idea - at least in the form it has usually been expressed.
I'm not saying the subeject of the folio can't be alchemy. What I'm saying is that the images do not connect with the well-known and well-studied corpus of western European alchemy, and it's important to try and get interpretations o the images right (as right as we can) if we're to be of any service to manuscript studies, to the Beinecke, and most of all to people working on the manuscript's written text, which most people think is written in an Italian humanist hand.
22 March, 2022 04:42
I am not an expert in distillation but doesn't the distillation process require some kind of heat source? Where is the heat source?
What is the input? What is the output? What are they trying to collect? Do they want the condensed stuff that is left after the vaporization of what they want to get rid of? Or are they collecting the stuff that is vaporized and collecting the condensation?
(18-03-2024, 05:50 PM)pjburkshire Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (18-03-2024, 05:29 PM)bi3mw Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. (18-03-2024, 05:13 PM)pjburkshire Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Can you explain what you mean by "get a lot out of"? Are you saying that you still think that Quire 13 is about the distillation of something? If so, can you elaborate? Which elements in which illustrations? What do you think is being distilled?
(offtopic)
In order not to go too much offtopic, here is a short note:
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
I agree with the 1 comment "the images do not connect":
D.O'Donovan. said...
The 'alchemical' theory has been around for a century and more, so it might be a good idea to see why it has never gone anywhere and why speciaists in the history of western Europe's alchemy and alchemical imagery uniformly reject the idea - at least in the form it has usually been expressed.
I'm not saying the subeject of the folio can't be alchemy. What I'm saying is that the images do not connect with the well-known and well-studied corpus of western European alchemy, and it's important to try and get interpretations o the images right (as right as we can) if we're to be of any service to manuscript studies, to the Beinecke, and most of all to people working on the manuscript's written text, which most people think is written in an Italian humanist hand.
22 March, 2022 04:42
I am not an expert in distillation but doesn't the distillation process require some kind of heat source? Where is the heat source?
What is the input? What is the output? What are they trying to collect? Do they want the condensed stuff that is left after the vaporization of what they want to get rid of? Or are they collecting the stuff that is vaporized and collecting the condensation?
You are not allowed to view links.
Register or
Login to view.
(18-03-2024, 05:50 PM)pjburkshire Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I agree with the 1 comment "the images do not connect":
Yes but it's a common misconception that for alchemy images should "connect" as early as the first quarter of the 15th century: very few illustrated alchemy books existed, the iconography and symbolism were not yet standardized. For example, the big red "seagull" weirdo on f1r: a forgotten Mercury symbol in a 15th c. manuscript.
Distillation had its own mystique with the quintessence (5th element) added to alchemical lore by frater Johannes de Rupescissa (Jean de Roquetaillade) in the 14th century.
There are other possibilities in natural philosophy, with analogies between... almost everything. Alchemy could sometimes be confused with astrology, medical herbalism, theology, ...