The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against

[rikforto]

There is, to be clear, no issue with using either traditional or simplified. I just used traditional because most of my exposure to the characters is in settings where the traditional ones are still relevant so I'm more comfortable with them; I just can't always recognize basic characters in simplified. Also, the Chinese Text Project is about as easy to work with as I can hope for a project involving a dead language and had it in traditional. I was flagging the switch and my source for anyone who looks closer.

The null hypothesis explains quite well, however, why 主 appears 7 times to daiin's 5 and you had to recruit two more words to get a loose fit that doesn't click any other words in the paragraph into place. The null hypothesis also predicts that the repeated verb has a very unstable spelling in its most obvious Voynichese crib:
治 = qoair
治 = okaiin
治 = olkal
治 = Chedy
治 = Sheod

This is what I would expect if the correlation were spurious, especially in absence of another Voynichese word repeated 5 times near the identified daiin cribs.

The problem that I'm having isn't one leap of faith or one difficulty with repeating your results. It's that the methodology you used to apparently find 主 in the SPS is contingent on a lot of judgement calls that can't be generalized, and if accepted there are no obvious avenues that anyone can see for extending that insight.

I see another possible crib, but using it will take some finesse and so that is going to have to wait for another day; I have need to go to the gym