The Voynich Ninja
A vague idea - Printable Version

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A vague idea - Koen G - 26-05-2017

Whenever I think in a broad philosophical way about what the Voynich text could actually be, one idea often lurks in the shadows, but I find it hard to explain, partially because I don't know yet if and how it could work. So -disclaimer- expect some vague, half-baked and unfounded hypothesizing in what follows.


  1. People before the advent of the printing press had a lot more information in their memories than we do now. This difference has even gotten much bigger in the (mobile) internet age, where we have the answer to every question in a piece of glass we carry around in our pockets. But before, it was perfectly normal for an entertainer to perform, say, the Iliad, over several days, completely by heart. But even common farmers would have beaten the best of us in a contest of memory, just because they were required to develop their mnemonic techniques much more than we are.
  2. Medieval books were generally written with a very specific audience in mind, sometimes even just one person.
  3. If the scribe knew what his reader(s) knew by heart, this knowledge could be exploited to obscure the text (for whatever reason).
In many ways, the VM text lacks entropy. A simplified glyph set for one, and a relatively predictable word/sentence structure.

So I wonder... might the Voynich text be somewhat like this image?

   

The information density of this image is greatly decreased. I removed all color saturation, and it is built of some large blocks instead of many different small ones. Yet in your mind this is enough to complete the picture. I provide the prompt, and you can perfectly fill in his facial expression, the shape of his bow, the position of his hands and the color of his clothes.

So basically what I'm getting at is the following: is it possible that "Voynichese" is just a prompt? Just enough information for the reader to add what's in his mind already? 

Another parallel. Imagine that I wanted you to sing a certain song, but I don't want to write down the text because others are not allowed to read the exact lyrics. But I know you know the lyrics by heart. So in this case, I might just present you with the notes, and this relatively low entropy communication would be enough for you to sing the high-entropy song text.

Now if this is at all possible in some way or another, this also means we will never be able to read the manuscript, because the information was already in people's minds. The manuscript just helps them recall it. That is, unless the information is a text that has been recorded normally in another source.

Don't know if any of this makes any sense Sleepy

RE: A vague idea - -JKP- - 26-05-2017

(26-05-2017, 08:51 PM)Koen Gh. Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view....
Don't know if any of this makes any sense Sleepy


I thought you explained it quite well.

For a while I thought this might be possible, thought it might be a document created for someone's personal use, in which case references, rather than full-blown explanations, would be enough but... the more I looked at the text, the more it looked to me that more than one scribe was involved (I knew nothing about Currier at the time), in which case, unless it was a family member helping out, the possibility of it being for personal use seemed less likely.

But, if it were for family use, or for a small "in the know" group, then references might be enough.

RE: A vague idea - davidjackson - 26-05-2017

A bit like those internet memes:
Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe
Or
7H15 M3554G3
53RV35 7O PR0V3
H0W 0UR M1ND5 C4N
D0 4M4Z1NG 7H1NG5!
1MPR3551V3 7H1NG5!
1N 7H3 B3G1NN1NG
17 WA5 H4RD BU7
N0W, 0N 7H15 LIN3
Y0UR M1ND 1S
R34D1NG 17
4U70M471C4LLY
W17H 0U7 3V3N
7H1NK1NG 4B0U7 17,
B3 PROUD! 0NLY
C3R741N P30PL3 C4N
R3AD 7H15.

RE: A vague idea - Koen G - 26-05-2017

Yeah, kind of. With some practice, one can read such things with ease.
The reason why I favor explanations in this style is that they would still allow the user to consult the text without having to calculate ciphers or gematria for hours...


A similar idea is that an extended text was available somewhere and the VM is an illustrated one for on the road