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[split] Torsten's criticism of Bowern & Lindemann

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• [split] Torsten's criticism of Bowern & Lindemann

• [split] Torsten's criticism of Bowern & Lindemann

  Torsten > 14-08-2024, 01:53 AM

  [Edit KG: this thread split off from here: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. ]
  
  

  (14-08-2024, 12:50 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (13-08-2024, 11:46 AM)Torsten Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The primary sources for the article appear to be interviews with Lisa Davis and Claire Bowern

  
  You are guessing, and you are guessing wrong. I know of at least five people who have been involved, and there were probably more.

  
  No guessing is required since the article is actually about Lisa Fagin Davis and her views about the Voynich manuscript. Yes, the article does mention other perspectives, including two sentences about Andreas Schinner and my research. But, the sole purpose of these two sentences is to serve as an introduction to Lisa Fagin Davis's perspective on our research. And I know for sure that Ariel Sabar never asked us about our research.
  
  

  (14-08-2024, 12:50 AM)ReneZ Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (13-08-2024, 11:46 AM)Torsten Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.For instance the article states "The mix of word lengths and the ratio of unique words to total words were similarly language-like." The contrary is true. The word length distribution matches almost perfectly a binomial distribution and is therefore not language like.

  
  This suggests that there should exist a good test for what is language-lilke and what is not. Well I don't think so.
  Stolfi did not write that the word length distribution is not language like, and anyway, Stolfi is not a linguist. Neither am I for that matter.
  
  I can't decide for myself to what extent the text is language-like, but at first sight it is very language like, while in important details it is less so. Saying that it is not language-like would be more incorrect in my opinion.

  
  Claire Bowern, a linguist, states: "Short words tend to be the most common words in natural language texts, but the most common Voynich words have four or five letters." [Bowern and Lindemann 2020].
  
  In linguistics, the brevity law (also called Zipf's law of abbreviation) is a linguistic law that qualitatively states that the more frequently a word is used, the shorter that word tends to be. Zipf (1935) posited that wordforms are optimized to minimize utterances communicative costs (see You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.). For example, consider the length of frequently used words in English, such as "a", "is," or "I".

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Koen G > 14-08-2024, 09:58 AM

  I would contest that we do not know the proper parsing of glyphs in Voynichese. For all we know, words like daiin and chor are two letters.

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Torsten > 14-08-2024, 10:27 AM

  (14-08-2024, 09:58 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I would contest that we do not know the proper parsing of glyphs in Voynichese. For all we know, words like daiin and chor are two letters.

  
  The parsing of words does not affect the overall word length distribution. It merely shifts the mean, as every word is now shorter. 
  By the way, if you parse daiin as [da-iin?] and chor as [ch-or?] how do you parse vords like aiin, okaiin, cho, or chol?

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Koen G > 14-08-2024, 12:06 PM

  (14-08-2024, 10:27 AM)Torsten Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The parsing of words does not affect the overall word length distribution. It merely shifts the mean, as every word is now shorter. 
  By the way, if you parse daiin as [da-iin?] and chor as [ch-or?] how do you parse vords like aiin, okaiin, cho, or chol?

  
  One could parse like d-aiin and cho-r. In that case, the examples you give would be parsed aiin, o-k-aiin, cho and cho-l. I agree that this would be more of a shift than a redistribution though, but the point remains that we actually do not know word length in Voynichese.

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Torsten > 14-08-2024, 12:22 PM

  (14-08-2024, 12:06 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (14-08-2024, 10:27 AM)Torsten Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.The parsing of words does not affect the overall word length distribution. It merely shifts the mean, as every word is now shorter. 
  By the way, if you parse daiin as [da-iin?] and chor as [ch-or?] how do you parse vords like aiin, okaiin, cho, or chol?

  
  One could parse like d-aiin and cho-r. In that case, the examples you give would be parsed aiin, o-k-aiin, cho and cho-l. I agree that this would be more of a shift than a redistribution though, but the point remains that we actually do not know word length in Voynichese.

  
  Again Zipfs law of abbreviation is about the distribution of the word length. If the word lengths are unknown, as you now claim, it is especially misleading to state: "The mix of word lengths and the ratio of unique words to total words were similarly language-like." 
  
  Out of curiosity, if you parse "chor" as [cho-r], how would you then parse "char," "cheor," and "cheom"? Similarly, if you parse "daiin" as [d-aiin], how would you parse words like "daiir," "daiis," or "daiim"? And how do you account for the increase in the number of letters resulting from this parsing method?

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Koen G > 14-08-2024, 12:33 PM

  I do not have a full system of parsing worked out. I just think it is not unreasonable to point out that the correct parsing of Voynichese remains a critical unanswered question, and we should not just assume that EVA (or any other such system) equals Voynichese. I would personally not take word length into account as a factor, since we simply don't know it.
  
  
  (An increase in the number of characters need not be problematic. How many different characters are there in medieval manuscripts? I wouldn't like to count them.)

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Torsten > 14-08-2024, 04:37 PM

  (14-08-2024, 12:33 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I do not have a full system of parsing worked out. I just think it is not unreasonable to point out that the correct parsing of Voynichese remains a critical unanswered question, and we should not just assume that EVA (or any other such system) equals Voynichese. I would personally not take word length into account as a factor, since we simply don't know it.
  
  (An increase in the number of characters need not be problematic. How many different characters are there in medieval manuscripts? I wouldn't like to count them.)

  
  Does this mean you are only considering evidence that supports your hypotheses about the Voynich? 
  
  By the way, do you agree with Lisas Fagin Davis views on the Voynich? If yes, do you also agree with Lisa that Ahmet Ardıç Turkish attempt is interesting (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)? Do you agree with her statement about the identity of the five scribes (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) or with her statement that it is possible to distinguish different scribal hands? Do you agree with her when she says "In the 1970s, Captain Prescott Currier discerned only two different patterns of letter frequency and glyph combinations on different sets of leaves." (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) or do you believe Prescott Currier stating "This gives us a total of two languages and six to eight scribes" (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)? And if you didn't agree with Lisas views shouldn't it be possible to discuss all hypotheses about the Voynich manuscript critically?

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Emma May Smith > 14-08-2024, 06:01 PM

  (14-08-2024, 04:37 PM)Torsten Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.

  (14-08-2024, 12:33 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I do not have a full system of parsing worked out. I just think it is not unreasonable to point out that the correct parsing of Voynichese remains a critical unanswered question, and we should not just assume that EVA (or any other such system) equals Voynichese. I would personally not take word length into account as a factor, since we simply don't know it.
  
  (An increase in the number of characters need not be problematic. How many different characters are there in medieval manuscripts? I wouldn't like to count them.)

  
  Does this mean you are only considering evidence that supports your hypotheses about the Voynich? 
  
  By the way, do you agree with Lisas Fagin Davis views on the Voynich? If yes, do you also agree with Lisa that Ahmet Ardıç Turkish attempt is interesting (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)? Do you agree with her statement about the identity of the five scribes (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) or with her statement that it is possible to distinguish different scribal hands? Do you agree with her when she says "In the 1970s, Captain Prescott Currier discerned only two different patterns of letter frequency and glyph combinations on different sets of leaves." (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) or do you believe Prescott Currier stating "This gives us a total of two languages and six to eight scribes" (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)? And if you didn't agree with Lisas views shouldn't it be possible to discuss all hypotheses about the Voynich manuscript critically?

  
  Torsten, while academic debate can be vigorous, it's better to adopt a tone which assumes the best of the people you're talking to. I know it can be frustrating when you see yourself in the right and everybody else needs to be corrected, but people might genuinely see things differently.
  
  They might also want the chance to step out of a debate and think without the pressure of responding to accusations. Sometimes it's better to do the same ourselves rather than resorting to unproductive confrontation. In the end, we're not on a deadline for the work we're involved with. It should also be fun and interesting: none of us are getting paid to be here.

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Koen G > 14-08-2024, 06:52 PM

  (14-08-2024, 04:37 PM)Torsten Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Does this mean you are only considering evidence that supports your hypotheses about the Voynich? 

  
  No. My opinion is that we need more work on parsing before meaningful word length research can be done. So I look at all word length research with some reservations. I'm not sure which hypothesis of mine it is I am favoring here. Us not knowing for certain how Voynichese should be parsed is a fact.
  
  Your questions:
  

  • By the way, do you agree with Lisas Fagin Davis views on the Voynich?
    --> some things yes, some things no. 
    
  • If yes, do you also agree with Lisa that Ahmet Ardıç Turkish attempt is interesting (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)? 
    --> initially I was just as excited about the Turkic theory, and I may have written similarly positive things. Now that I have learned more about it, I think it is very bad.
    
  • Do you agree with her statement about the identity of the five scribes (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) or with her statement that it is possible to distinguish different scribal hands?
    --> I find this very hard to research myself, so I have to trust her on this. There are certainly more than one scribes, and I am happy to work with Lisa's scribes until she or someone equally qualified proposes a revision.
    
  • Do you agree with her when she says "In the 1970s, Captain Prescott Currier discerned only two different patterns of letter frequency and glyph combinations on different sets of leaves." (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.) or do you believe Prescott Currier stating "This gives us a total of two languages and six to eight scribes" (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)?
    --> Both are correct in a way. Currier's merit is his discovery of different dialects, coinciding with two hands. He did indeed mention the possibility of more scribes, but this seems to have been more of an afterthought.
  • And if you didn't agree with Lisas views shouldn't it be possible to discuss all hypotheses about the Voynich manuscript critically?
    --> We have to be critical of everything, but we also have to know when expertise takes precedence. When it comes to the matter of Lisa's scribes, the overwhelming sentiment on the forum seems to be that paleography is such a specialized subject, that we just have to accept her views as the most authoritative statements we have on the matter. Until another paleographer comes along and challenges these views, there are five scribes as far as I am concerned.
    

  
  I would also really encourage you to take Emma's post to heart, because she phrases well how your contributions are perceived. To keep aggressively chasing people with all potentially contradictory or mistaken things they have ever said is very unpleasant and unproductive.

• RE: Voynich Article in The Atlantic

  Torsten > 14-08-2024, 11:38 PM

  (14-08-2024, 06:52 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.--> We have to be critical of everything, but we also have to know when expertise takes precedence. When it comes to the matter of Lisa's scribes, the overwhelming sentiment on the forum seems to be that paleography is such a specialized subject, that we just have to accept her views as the most authoritative statements we have on the matter. Until another paleographer comes along and challenges these views, there are five scribes as far as I am concerned.

  
  I can accept this as your viewpoint. But does this mean that I have to adopt this view point? Does that mean that it is not allowed to challenge authoritative statements or the overwhelming sentiment on a subject? Shouldn't it be easy to contradict my arguments if they are unreasonable (see You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)? Isn't Lisa stating "Along with anyone else, Torsten is more than welcome to disagree with me in accordance with his own observations, as no one should accept my conclusions without critical analysis" (You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.)?
  
  

  (14-08-2024, 06:52 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.To keep aggressively chasing people with all potentially contradictory or mistaken things they have ever said is very unpleasant and unproductive.

  
  I agree that it doesn't matter what Lisa said about Ahmet Ardıç Turkish attempt or the identity of the five scribes. In the first case she didn't state it as a fact and in the second case it is obviously a mistake. I only used this as examples since they didn't require long explanations. Sorry for that. I should have used another way to demonstrate that everybody can make mistakes.
  
  

  (14-08-2024, 06:52 PM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Currier's merit is his discovery of different dialects, coinciding with two hands. He did indeed mention the possibility of more scribes, but this seems to have been more of an afterthought.

  
  Currier did more than that. In the linear transcription file, as well as on resources like the You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. or You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view., Currier’s scribal identifications are listed for each page. These identifications include not only Scribe 1 and Scribe 2, but also Scribe 3, 4, 5, X and Y. Lisa Fagin Davis argues, "My preliminary results identify five hands—the two defined by Prescott Currier as Scribe 1 and Scribe 2, and three more, designated Scribe 3, Scribe 4, and Scribe 5" (Lisa Fagin Davis 2020, p. 172). However, this description is inaccurate. Lisa attributes all pages in language A to Scribe 1, including those in the Pharmaceutical section. In contrast, Currier only attributes the Herbal A pages to Scribe 1. In other words, Lisa is using Currier's language identification to define Scribe 1, which in my view, weakens the argument that Scribe 1 directly corresponds to the identification of language A.
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