New Post: "I Do Listen to the Experts. Do YOU?"

[ReneZ]

I would like to stress the difference between proof and evidence, or at least how I use these words.

As Lisa already said, and I agree, there is almost nothing that can be proven.

However, one can collect and show evidence.
This can and should be done for both cases. It can then be weighed against each other.
Of course, it is both possible to have evidence for (in favour of) something, and against something.

A  letter that has been preserved is a piece of evidence. 
A hypothesis is not a piece of evidence.

once charged on the basis of direct evidence,

Not if there isn't any direct evidence. That's the situation we are dealing with here.

he has not actually claimed), that the Marci letter IS a fake.

Oh he has. Karl already hinted at it.

He only needs to show that it is plausible that it is a fake

I agree that that would help his case a lot.

But just imagine:
If the Voynich MS did not exist, and the Marci letter did not exist;
and if Voynich decided to create a fake letter from Marci to Kircher to provide some fake provenance;

How could Voynich have known in the first place that such a book was once sent from Marci to Kircher?

He would have to search in the Kircher correspondence, before knowing that Kircher had anything to do with it.

So, the odds are completely against such a scenario.