The Voynich Ninja

(02-02-2025, 09:54 PM)Addsamuels Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Since no-one has solved this damned manuscript, is spending time on this manuscript just self-induced pain?

As Confucius said, "Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance", and VMS is another great proof of it.
Studying VMS is not like studying Zodiac 340 or Cryptos, VMS has a real world around it and has a great number of knowledgeable and helpful people around it to help.
If you can manage a journey without much of facts, or lot of confusing ones, then VMS is a great journey to take, otherwise, yes, it can cause some pain, but it is not a curse.

"All human knowledge takes the form of interpretation." (WB)

(03-02-2025, 12:40 PM)oshfdk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.By the way, there is a new proposed reading for 116v: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.


I don't have any constructive feedback (I don't really expect marginalia to be meaningful, I suppose it's most likely a mnemonic of sorts, and I certainly don't know Occitan). What is your opinion?

For the 116v "translation" is unbelievable how people dream.
They change words, add letters maybe and think they have it.
The problem is then even if one provides proofs and true words- the people continue to live in the dreaming.

By dreaming we will not have the solution. The manuscript is insidious and scientific. We need a team of serious people, who believe in a solution  and progress further.
It is enough to stare at the images only and make educated guesses. It is high time to go deep into the contents.

The marginalia of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. is absolutely reasonable and scientific note, concerning the herb below: "malher altae® cure for skin yellowing..."
Everybody who knows the Latin alphabet can read at least the first two words. Malher is an ancient word for marshmallow , alttae ot althae is a special species, which really is used for skin healings (removal of black spots). How may the people think that this has no meaning. This is an insult of the author's intelligence. 
116V is a recipe for healing scars after venereal disease. Maybe this is the famous recipe, with which Jakub a Tepence has cured Rudolf II - who knows.
The last sentence is my fantasy, but if you look at the fruit paintings of the face of this kaiser, you may make the conclusion about the last foil recipe.

So my opinion is that the author of the script and the coder/user were much more wise than we today. I am sorry if someone feels offended. But we need to face the truth and start really be more professional and scientific. I mean not to go and talk with  Chat GPT, but to travel in the ancient manuscripts and find their the anchor.
BR: Vessy

(03-02-2025, 05:15 PM)BessAgritianin Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.For the 116v "translation" is unbelievable how people dream.
They change words, add letters maybe and think they have it.
The problem is then even if one provides proofs and true words- the people continue to live in the dreaming.

I have no idea whether this or that reading of You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. or You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. makes any sense - I'm not proficient in Latin or Moravian or Occitan, I wouldn't be able to differentiate between unrealistic word salad and a plausible interpretation. Hence, I cannot evaluate your proofs and translations as they are now. There is a very simple way to improve your argument, though, if you find a contemporary (~XV century) book that shows verbatim some of the transcriptions you made, this will work as a very strong argument. For example, as far as I understand, there is one attested usage of "poxleber" in a later transcription of a medieval text, and this already significantly strengthens the case of "poxleber".

(03-02-2025, 10:09 AM)BessAgritianin Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.there is no motivation in the researchers to find the real answer. If there was a prze- let us say 2 millions (like a normal scientific grant) you will find immediately the right team and people to find maybe not complete but some answers. 

No motivation???

I can hardly imagine any problem that has attracted more attention than the Voynich MS.
If anything, there is too much motivation.

There has never been a lack of intelligence,
there has not been a lack of resources,
and there has not been a lack of imagination.

It is clear that whoever solves the MS will become famous and is likely to have some financial benefit in any case.

2 Million will just attract more nonsense.

I cannot agree more with Rene. Offering a large prize would work if only dedicated researchers are attracted. But we all know that wouldn't be the case. 

To someone approaching the Voynich with no previous knowledge, the thing looks like it should be solvable. So we get a theory. Imagine that but a thousand times more than today. The study of the manuscript would become impossible. Imagine the ripple effects on other disciplines. People like art historians and paleographers would need to install a Voynich filter to keep their inbox workable.

Here's my view on the subject of this thread: the Voynich offers people the chance to wrestle with the Dunning–Kruger effect, "a cognitive bias in which people with limited competence in a particular domain overestimate their abilities." This has nothing to do with a person's overall intelligence, but rather their ability to understand that they have an awful lot to learn about the subject first.



Imagine someone who is not trained in coding accepting a job as a computer programmer. He knows his way around generative AI and manages to show some functional bits of code. He is on the "peak of mount stupid": he believes he can code, but actually he has none of the required skills, experience and competence.

In programming though, the required result is relatively concrete: I want the program to do "this". Our AI programmer will soon find out that he cannot deliver. Imagine the dread that overcomes him. He is now in the valley of despair. If he wants to get out, he has to stop his AI routines, learn coding (in a class or targeted self study) and then re-integrate AI into his workflow.

The Voynich leaves many people stranded on mount Stupid. But since this is a hobby, and not always as easy to assess as the performance of a computer program, nothing is driving them down to the valley of despair. So you get a whole mountain range, with on each peak someone yelling their theories at the others and getting upset that nobody joins them.

Luckily there are alternatives to this, and many people here on the forum and elsewhere appreciate having been in the valley and continuously climbing the slope out of it. But that requires a willingness to learn, to understand where criticism is coming from. To explore ways to apply scientific rigor to the study.

I don't really see the Voynich as something that actively destroys lives (I don't know of any examples myself, but I'm sure there are some). It's just one of the ways people can show their willingness to improve their critical thinking. If uncle Robert hadn't developed a crazy Voynich theory, maybe it would have been anti-vax rants instead. Or something about aliens. Or some conspiracy theory. The Voynich does not cause this, it is just one of the many paths to Mount Stupid.

(04-02-2025, 05:27 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I cannot agree more with Rene. Offering a large prize would work if only dedicated researchers are attracted. But we all know that wouldn't be the case. 

How do we all know that dedicated researchers won't be attracted?

Do you think the offer of a $1 million prize for the decipherment of the Indus Valley script is a mistake?

Do you think all the many other prizes offered for solution to problems are a mistake?

If you do think that other prizes are valuable then why is the Voynich manuscript uniquely different?

Ultimately, if someone wants to put up the money for a prize then there will be a prize as it is their choice. At the moment nobody has, so such a prize does not exist.

(04-02-2025, 04:36 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.If anything, there is too much motivation.

There has never been a lack of intelligence,
there has not been a lack of resources,
and there has not been a lack of imagination.

More motivation would certainly be a good thing. More intelligence would be beneficial. More resources would also be beneficial. More imagination would help too.

(04-02-2025, 05:27 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I don't really see the Voynich as something that actively destroys lives (I don't know of any examples myself, but I'm sure there are some). It's just one of the ways people can show their willingness to improve their critical thinking. If uncle Robert hadn't developed a crazy Voynich theory, maybe it would have been anti-vax rants instead. Or something about aliens. Or some conspiracy theory.

Newbold was clearly destroyed by the Voynich.
Brumbaugh could have destroyed his career with it.
I think there are arguably quite a number of other people whose lives have been damaged by their Voynich obsession.

Whatever one might think of Gérard Cheshire's theory or Ahmet Ardic's theory or any others I think it unfair to compare them with crazy alien conspiracy theories.

(04-02-2025, 11:58 AM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.How do we all know that dedicated researchers won't be attracted?

Well there is no possibility to choose, like: "Only serious and knowledgeable people may apply".

In regular scientific problems that is never an issue.
You won't find unknowledgeable amateurs trying to solve any of the many unsolved mathematical problems.

There is a high prize for the first scientific proof of paranormal activity, issued by one James Randi.
I am not aware that this has led to serious results or any form of 'getting closer to' such evidence.

By the way, on the topic of this thread, it is a bad idea (not necessarily unhealthy though) for students preparing for exams or preparing theses, to spend any time on the Voynich Ms.

One always has to set one's priorities.