Expert opinions about the VMS

[Anton]

First, I don't think it is correct to speak of "experts on the Voynich manuscript's imagery" in the sense of the word "expert" that we are discussing here. This is because such thing as "Voynich imagery" is not a specifically recognized field of science. There are no journals on "Voynich imagery", no chairs on that subject in universities, no departments in academia etc. I don't know if there were a more or less significant number of peer-reviewed papers on Voynich imagery in scientific journals.

Hence, we could speak of "experts (on different things) discussing (or assessing) Voynich manuscript's imagery", but not of "experts on the VMS imagery".

We could speak of persons having dedicated much time and effort to studiyng the VMS imagery. And those may well be experts in this or that kind of imagery. But that does not make them "experts on the VMS imagery". For example, if Diane is an expert in iconographic analysis and provenancing, I would not call her an "expert in VMS imagery". Likewise, I would not call Nick Pelling "an expert in VMS cryptology", Stephen Bax "an expert in VMS linguistics" or myself  "an expert in VMS telecommunications".

Second, the point of discussion here seems to be that Diane is not mentioned amongst the row of "proper, qualified opinions about the imagery" as Rene put it down. I'm not sure if Rene intended this list to be exhaustive: if he did not, then I see no grounds for further discussion of this issue, and if he did, then the question is of course in the definition of "proper and qualified".

Indeed: what should be the criteria by which an (supposed) expert's opinion is to be "respected" or "trusted" by non-experts? Let's say, a person comes in and makes some statements. What should we ask him to support his credibility? Should we ask him to show us his diploma? His CV? His list of peer-reviewed papers? His professional certificates? Letters of recommendation, may be?