[Article] Review on "The Linguistics of the Voynich Manuscript"

[Stephen Carlson]

The idea that it is meaningless text raises a fundamental question: would anyone go to such lengths only to end up writing nothing meaningful ? I think this is rather unlikely.

Personally, I've never found this line of argument appealing. If you look at the immense ingenuity displayed in fakes and hoaxes over the centuries, the amount of effort devoted to them is the least surprising thing. On other hand, the stumbling block to these theories is how it was done. But then again, how it was done is the stumbling block to every theory about the MS.

To stay on topic, the most disappointing aspect of the paper that T&S are responding is the oversight of their work, because it is relatively more plausible than the other hoax alteratives and a good paper ought to dispose of its strongest alternatives, not its weakest. That said, I'm not sure that linguists would have any particular insight into the potential defects of the T&S proposal.