Re: This is not a conlang and VOYNICH

----- Original Message -----
From: "John Cowan" <jcowan@...>

> Steg Belsky scripsit:
>
>> A recent article in Wired Magazine interviewed someone who said that he
>> proved it's all gibberish:
>>
>> http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.09/rugg.html?pg=1
>
> Despite what it says in the _Wired_ article, Voynichologists in
> general don't accept his results: they prove too little or too much.
> Yes, Voynichese can be generated by fairly simple mechanical means
> (the grilles) *if* you use enough of them.  So could Classical Chinese
> text, unfortunately.  The methods Rugg actually uses are debunked briefly
> at
> http://www.voynich.nu/solvers.html (search on the page for "Rugg").
>
> http://www.voynich.nu is a good starting point for people interested in
> the VM.  There's a mailing list archived at http://www.voynich.net .
I'm glad to know that there is controversy over Rugg's debunking.  I read
his article and wasn't myself convinced of his "verifyer approach" to his
proof of the manuscript's gibberish.  This may put me in the camp with the
Voynichologists who resent his having explained too little (or too much as
you say), but he hasn't taken into consideration that the language behind
the code may not be a natural one; in noting that the affixes seem to
change, he doesn't consider that the language, invented or otherwise, may
change mid-course.  If Edward Kelly is the culprit, he also helped John Dee
"discover" the Enochian tongue.  Rugg, nor any of the other people who
suggest it, does not convincingly explain why Kelly would want to carry out
such a hoax.  Rugg implies that it was for money, but that seems so
pedestrian, especially where Kelly the Scryer is concerned.  I'm not
impressed, so far, by the verifyer approach.  Perhaps the article was not
adept enough at explaining it, but it seems that coming upon a sure-fire
method to question the validity of all fields of knowledge, when fields of
knowledge contain within them complex and various approaches to verity and
argument, is arrogant.

Sally