+- The Voynich Ninja (https://www.voynich.ninja)
+-- Forum: Voynich Research (https://www.voynich.ninja/forum-27.html)
+--- Forum: Voynich Talk (https://www.voynich.ninja/forum-6.html)
+--- Thread: [split] Diplomatic ciphers (/thread-2732.html)
[split] Diplomatic ciphers - Mark Knowles - 06-04-2019
I must confess I haven't read all the replies and I, as some others know, believe it to be a cipher. Now in a sense a cipher is a deception by its nature, so I don't know if that is what you meant by a "deception".
You say: "The only third option is that the language-like properties we see in script, statistics and layout are an UNintended side effect of whatever else is going on. But that feels so unlikely."
In think the language like properties we see in the script and statistics are not inconsistent with what I term an "atypical" diplomatic cipher such as were used in Northern Italy in the early 15th century. So if I understand you correctly what you suggest to me seems not so unlikely.
As far as script goes, how familar are you with diplomatic cipher symbols of the time?
As far as statistics go how familiar are you with how diplomatic ciphers work? I use the word "atypical" as this is clearly not a standard diplomatic cipher, but that is where I believe the influences come from. I also think this was a turbulent time in diplomatic cipher development and so techniques had not yet been standardised.
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - -JKP- - 07-04-2019
I'm quite familiar with diplomatic ciphers of the time. They are many-to-one and one-to-many plus numerous nulls plus lookup charts for common names/words, which has significantly different statistical properties from Voynichese.
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - Mark Knowles - 07-04-2019
JKP: What have you read about diplomatic ciphers?
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - Mark Knowles - 07-04-2019
JKP: The interesting question to me is then how a diplomatic cipher of the time can deviate as little as possible from the standard whilst still producing the same statistical properties that we see with the Voynich text. This is where the word "atypical" comes in. I have suggested elsewhere an idea of how that might be the case.
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - -JKP- - 07-04-2019
I've posted this before on Nick's blog, but the diplomatic ciphers have HUGE character sets because they include both one-to-many, many-to-one, and many null characters (plus a glossary of characters for commonly used names like that of the pope or the current emperor).
A single cipher sometimes has more than 200 glyphs and each cipher is given a new set, resulting in thousands of different glyphs.
In contrast, Voynichese has a very limited glyph set, even compared to some natural-language alphabets.
.
The diplomatic ciphers are extremely varied in where a glyph can occur in a word, partly due to the one-to-many/many-to-one structure and partly because it's a substitution cipher.
In contrast, Voynichese glyphs have very constrained positions within tokens.
These are two very significant differences.
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - Mark Knowles - 07-04-2019
My answer to your objections are as follows:
1) multiple character strings mapping to individual characters would increase the fundamental character set. i.e. "$#" -> "g"
2) As I have suggested some time ago on Nick's blog. rare Voynich characters could map to specific words as diplomatic ciphers do for words like "Pope" or "Duke of Milan".
3) I think null "words" are very plausible and null character string possible.
The interesring point that you have raised is the positional one. I wonder to what extent that can be reconcilled with a multiple character string mapping to a specific letter of the alphabet as I have described.
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - VViews - 08-04-2019
There is an additional aspect about glyphs and their position that Nick brought up a while ago on his site. It's an old post so I don't know if he still believes this, but he stated that:
"...the “vowel” glyphs (a / e / i / o / y) are like many Budapest workers – they only get to pay their rent by holding down two or more different jobs at the same time (though normally only one job at any given moment). For example, I don’t believe that the “o” in “qo” has anything at all to do with the “o”s in “ot”, “or” or “ol” (you can tell this because “qol” only pops up in those later sections where you find free-standing “l” glyphs).
Similarly, I don’t think the “a” in “aiin” is in any way linked with the “a” in “al”, or even with the “a” in “aiir” (because their usage and context patterns are so different). Yet once you fully accept that this is the case, you’re more or less forced to follow a long path of uncomfortable reasoning that leads you right to the doorstep of an even more uncomfortable conclusion: that the cover cipher is largely formed of groups of letters. Which is to say, that a / e / i / o / y have no independent meaning except as part of the letters with which they are immediately paired or grouped".
See more in his You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - -JKP- - 08-04-2019
(08-04-2019, 12:54 PM)VViews Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view....
Which is to say, that a / e / i / o / y have no independent meaning except as part of the letters with which they are immediately paired or grouped".
...
For the most part, I agree with this.
This would be true of any cipher that uses biglyphs, for example.
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - Mark Knowles - 08-04-2019
VViews & JKP: That exactly fits with my previous suggestion and so would fit with my notion of an "atypical" diplomatic cipher.
This suggestion being that sequences of Voynich characters map to individual letters, sequences of letters or nulls.
So for example:
"#$" -> "g"
"@%%" -> "fa"
"$&&%#" -> "" i.e. null
RE: Statement: IF Voynichese does not represent natural language... - -JKP- - 08-04-2019
(08-04-2019, 01:39 PM)Mark Knowles Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.VViews & JKP: That exactly fits with my previous suggestion and so would fit with my notion of an "atypical" diplomatic cipher.
This suggestion being that sequences of Voynich characters map to individual letters, sequences of letters or nulls.
So for example:
"#$" -> "g"
"@%%" -> "fa"
"$&&%#" -> "" i.e. null
Mark, you need to look at the VMS text. It is positional. Substitution ciphers, even if they are many-to-one and one-to-many are not positional in the same way as the VMS. They are also not the same in terms of the number of glyphs that are required to create such a system.