[Movie] Voynich Talk E3: Why your Voynich theory is wrong (pt2)

[Mark Knowles]

Where a glyph appears more than once in different places in the manuscript one should be wary of dismissing it as an accident unless one has a good argument for doing so

Yes, of course.  There are some weirdos that are very rare but almost certainly not accidents, like v, x, and the other strange symbols in the 4x17 sequence. 

But other weirdos, even frequent ones, may just be accidents.  Like b, u, g, which may be just "accidental" versions of n, an, m, or whatever.

All the best, --jorge

Yes, I agree. One has to be careful and rigorous. In each case one needs to list every instance of a symbol in the manuscript and how similar it is to a known symbol and so how likely it is to be an accident or error. In my studies I have seen symbols that I was not previously aware of. Symbols should not be ignored or dismissed without a good argument to justify that. I am of the view that the Voynich manuscript likely has a large number of glyphs with specific substitutions, but then I look it through the lens of diplomatic ciphers of the time where there were sometimes many glyphs with specific substitutions.