Possibility for an a-priori constructed philosophical mathematical language

[qoltedy]

The reality is that we still don't know what Voynichese is. Simple cipher, complex cipher, glossolalia, generated nonsense, code or a constructed language with mathematical, mystic, religious or philosophical underpinning. We just don't know.

I've noticed when I talk about hypothetical scenarios with scholars, they always think in terms of likelihood. So when Claire says it's probably not a constructed language, this means that the likelihood of it being a constructed language is very low given our knowledge of the MS and the nature of constructed languages around the 15th century.

The fact that she involves later examples strengthens the argument in a way, because it shows that even after the VM was made, the tendencies in constructed languages were still different.

Now again, we don't know what it is, and there is clearly nothing like it. So it could be something more mathematical, but she doesn't think of this as very likely.

To be honest, I don't think anyone knows what is most likely based on historical precedent though.

I think in this matter in particular, expertise in historical constructed languages tells us essentially nothing about the Voynich in particular. As you said, we don't know. And we cannot assess likelihoods of something we fundamentally don't understand.

However, I would like to highlight that in your video, your expert did go over some examples of historical conlangs, including more recent examples, what I thought was notably missing, and an important piece of the puzzle, were the conlang renaissance in the 1600s in England.

We have at least 5 major examples of different ideologies for mathematical, philosophical constructed languages of that time period.

Francis Lodwick - 1652, The Groundwork or Foundation laid (or So Intended) for the Framing of a New Perfect Language

Thomas Urquhart - 1653, Logopandecteision

George Dalgarno - 1661, Ars signorum 

John Wilkins - 1668, An Essay towards a Real Character, and a Philosophical Language

Gottfried Leibniz - 1678, Lingua generalis

Each of these have different philosophies and ideals for how to construct a philosophical, universal language from first principles reasoning.

Although we don't know for certain, at all what the Voynich Manuscript is, and whether it is one of these languages, like all scientific endeavors, it's a hypothesis that should be tested. With the Voynich, we have at least ruled out simple substitution ciphers of Latin, a hoax by Voynich himself, or pure glossolalia with no purpose or structure whatsoever.

We should take seriously the idea that it is likely enough to be a philosophical a priori language that we should do serious investigation testing whether this could be true, and seeing if there are parallels between any historical or modern examples of such languages.

If we're deferring purely to expertise, William Friedman, who studied the Voynich Manuscript for a decade said

"The Voynich Manuscript was an early attempt to construct an artificial or universal language of the A-Priori type" —Friedman

I think it's reasonable to consider it a serious possibility and a line of inquiry worth exploring further.