Need advice for testing of hypotheses related to the self-citation method

[Torsten]

I would rather not spend much time studying the "self-citation method" (SCM), but maybe I can still say something useful.  I don't believe the 'hoax' conclusion.  The main reason I will explain in my 10-minute talk at the conference. The second main reason is that it impossible to prove that some string "contains no message".  Or even to provide statistical evidence that would make such a conclusion more likely than not.

I fully agree that proving a string 'contains no message' is practically impossible, especially in the absence of external context or a known key. However, that question is distinct from examining whether the structure of the text can be explained by a formal, self-referential generation process — such as the Self-Citation Method. The SCM is not inherently a 'hoax' theory, but rather a model that reproduces specific statistical and structural features observed in the Voynich Manuscript. It addresses how the text could have been generated, not necessarily why or whether meaning is present. In that sense, exploring such a model provides insights into the mechanics of the text — without requiring us to draw conclusions about its semantic content.