[Article] Harvard physicist's take on the VMS

[rikforto]

I'm probably misrepresenting some arguments here, but to me it sounds like "if this text contains meaning, it must have been done in a way that's never been done before, therefore they must have done this whole other thing that has never been done before."

I think you come by this honestly, even if its not the fairest representation of the good versions of the arguments.

It's not exactly a strawman when someone who agrees with you restates your argument in a much weaker way, but this happens to Timm and Schinner a lot. They make pretty modest, bounded claims about their model and what it shows, but their imitators are quick to present extensions more the way you are describing. I'm not sure anyone has ever gotten quite as crass as your list of bullet points, but it is "in the air" around Time-and-Schinner-style models a lot.

It's also part of a bigger style of argumentation people around here are very fond of: "All these other theories don't work, so my theory surely must be accepted!" The linguistic theories haven't won out, so that means the non-linguistic theories surely must be correct! No buddy, the graveyard of Voynich theories has infinite capacity!