17-08-2016, 09:51 PM
I haven't read his thoughts on the Voynich manuscript, but I am familiar with Friedman (it's hard not to be if you have even half a foot in the technology field).
He was a very smart man and also rather humble (a trait I've noticed in quite a few very smart people), always acknowledging other people with special talents.
Some things are hard to explain. You can teach a person to play the piano, but how do you explain how to play it like Horowitz or Glenn Gould? You can't. A certain element is talent. No description of methodology or theory can put into words that special insight or skill that might unlock the mystery.
Some people approach the VMS with academic ambitions and there's a certain tradition and obligation to provide rationales, theories, and methodologies to make it through the peer-review gauntlet.
Others pursue it as a hobby. I don't think we can impose the same academic requirements on those who are working on it for fun unless they claim a solution that is not verifiable by others.
He was a very smart man and also rather humble (a trait I've noticed in quite a few very smart people), always acknowledging other people with special talents.
Some things are hard to explain. You can teach a person to play the piano, but how do you explain how to play it like Horowitz or Glenn Gould? You can't. A certain element is talent. No description of methodology or theory can put into words that special insight or skill that might unlock the mystery.
Some people approach the VMS with academic ambitions and there's a certain tradition and obligation to provide rationales, theories, and methodologies to make it through the peer-review gauntlet.
Others pursue it as a hobby. I don't think we can impose the same academic requirements on those who are working on it for fun unless they claim a solution that is not verifiable by others.