Ideas for Moving Voynich Research Forward

[Koen G]

I feel similarly about these things. A lot of good work is being done and new insights are gained, but these all feel like we are just scratching a bit at its armor. Like digging a hole in the ground which is tiny in comparison to the mantle of the earth, and does not even get close to its core. I know that the efforts of many people in many different areas have been tremendous, and countless hours of work have produced actual results. But still it feels like we are working in the margin. The largest gains are made in areas that are adjacent to the core mystery.

I used to think (many years ago) that not as much progress was being made because researchers didn't cooperate enough and potential solutions were not being investigated enough. But the reality is that every theory that ventures into "solution" territory is simply wrong.

Maybe this simile describes the best how I feel about the state of the research: we are erecting lots of scaffolding, but don't quite manage to get any of the actual building done.

This doesn't necessarily mean that we are approaching it the wrong way - it just means that the mystery remains unsolved for now.

As for AI, I don't think the current generation or its evolutions will help us. What we have now is a huge database that manages to sound like a person, but thinks like a computer. We will need to move closer to "real" AI first.