The Voynich Ninja

Here's a half formed idea that I'm going to throw amongst you all to see what response we get.

What is the Voynich text is nonsense - but the image aren't?

I've just finished re-Reading Carruthers art of memory and her ideas on memonics have stuck.

So imagine that every single image is encoded, and possibly the labels, into a mnemonic structure. A sort of visual shorthand. But the bulk of the text is filler to "throw you off the scent".

Possible? Of course it is. Probable? Hmm.

This theory suffers the same - I would not say weakness, - but peculiarity as any hoax theory. Namely, it has either to admit that the hoax is carefully developed to be strangely organized on purpose, or to explain how those strange properties may be normal from the stochastic perspective.

Like e.g. (taken from You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.):

Quote:1) 49% of first vords of all paragraphs of botanical folios are unique.

2) As already indicated in the title post, 66% of first vords of first paragraphs (or, which is the same thing, first vords of folios) of botanical folios are unique.

3) 31% of first vords of non-first (second, third etc.) paragraphs of botanical folios are unique.

So, in botanical folios, first words of first paragraphs are twice "more unique" (sorry!) than first words of non-first paragraphs. Is that OK for a filler?

Yes.
Why?
Because we return to my theory of text generation via a Volvelle, T.Timm's pairs or the Cardian Grille.

I have also found Carruther's book very interesting. The way we use our memories has changed so drastically ever since we started inventing stuff like the printing press - and now even more so. 

I'm going to link a very non-academic source now: a Ted talk by Joshua Foer. He's won one of those memory championships, where people compete to memorize, for example, as many numbers as possible. You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

The interesting thing is, later in his talk, he refers to the history of mnemonics, and how these people who compete in such competition are rediscovering the lost art. The guy who wins is not the one with the best brain: their brains have been scanned, and they are not different than ours. 

The guy who wins, is the one who makes the best mnemonics for himself.

Now, even more interestingly, almost everything he says can be connected with the way I describe the mnemonics that help to remember foreign plant names in the VM.

Foreign plant names are, in essence, nonsense words. So the best thing you can do to remember them, is to tie this nonsense information to information you have already (i.e. a figure from classical mythology). Additionally, you have to activate the visual part of your brain and make the brain work a bit. If the image you create is slightly absurd, it's even better.

This guy basically describes how the f89 mnemonics work.


Edit: about the text, it does contain information, but it's probably not a plain text - as in, the paragraphs look more like a list of similar names than "real prose". I do agree, of course, that the images carry much more information than one would say at first sight.

David:

Well, of 8 astro folios containing separate paragraphs of text, only in one folio the first word is unique. So you see the behaviour is not consistent across sections, as it would have been in the case of a "generating algorithm".

I even do not speak of tiny issues, such as for example:

otol is the most frequently mentioned "dayside star" (labeled object in f68r1), and the most frequently mentioned "star" overall.
odaiin is the most frequently mentioned "nightside star" (labeled object in f68r2), and the second to most frequently mentioned star overall.

Both of them are mentioned in f1r, and they are the only "stars" mentioned in f1r. (Needless to add they are mentioned in the same paragraph )

(13-04-2016, 07:56 PM)david Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Here's a half formed idea that I'm going to throw amongst you all to see what response we get.

What is the Voynich text is nonsense - but the image aren't?

I've just finished re-Reading Carruthers art of memory and her ideas on memonics have stuck.

So imagine that every single image is encoded, and possibly the labels, into a mnemonic structure. A sort of visual shorthand. But the bulk of the text is filler to "throw you off the scent".

Possible? Of course it is. Probable? Hmm.

Right from the beginning I've assumed it might not be possible to "decode" it or that it might not have meaning.
I've also assumed that the illustrator and scribe might be two different people and the text may not be related to the images (that it might be sensitive political commentary, for example).

The rigid structure of the text is concerning. It speaks against natural language but... it depends how you look it at and what system might have been used to encode (if it is in fact encoded).


But, there are patterns and characteristics that give me hope that there is meaning in the text and that it does relate to the pictures, and that keeps me going.

(13-04-2016, 07:56 PM)david Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Here's a half formed idea that I'm going to throw amongst you all to see what response we get.

What is the Voynich text is nonsense - but the image aren't?

I've just finished re-Reading Carruthers art of memory and her ideas on memonics have stuck.

So imagine that every single image is encoded, and possibly the labels, into a mnemonic structure. A sort of visual shorthand. But the bulk of the text is filler to "throw you off the scent".

Possible? Of course it is. Probable? Hmm.

It's equally probable that the text encodes information but not the same information that the images encode, and a bit more probable that the images are there to "throw you off the scent" of what the text is about. If you have a system of encoding information and a place to encode it you are probably going to make efficient use of your recording media, especially with a system as inefficient as writing or drawing.  The need to "throw you off the scent" assumes you have a context for understanding the information.  I don't see any indication that the context or content of VMS is in any way intuitive or obvious. 

It's reasonable to assume that the whole thing is a hoax.  It's also reasonable to assume that the whole thing is a meaningful document.  Actually proving either of these views is going to require more work.  If you want to assume a split document you can work on proving that the text is meaningless or that the images have meaning, but I don't think the idea is really helpful.  First because there isn't any way to prove the text is meaningless.  Second because so many people have interpreted the images in so many ways that you will need to find an organizing principle for the information encoded in the images to get any consensus on what the deeper meaning is.

Is it possible that beneath the surface of a planet in our solar system, say Mars, is life ?
You can say no. You can write one million papers about it and prove it. 
Are we sure then ?
No. If you dig deep and analyse the soil, you can be much surer.

So we just keep digging in the text and images.