Making The Case That Voynich Is A Hoax

DeadVulcan writes "The Voynich Manuscript, a mysterious book of uncertain age, is widely believed to be written either in an unknown language or a long-lost encryption scheme. Nature reports that computer scientist Gordon Rugg has demonstrated that it's possible to generate a text like the Voynich manuscript -- containing language-like regularities, despite being potentially meaningless -- using cryptographic techniques of the time. This lends some support to those who claim that the book is a hoax."

Comments

My 2 cents

[SYFer]

01001001011000110110100000100000011001000110010101 10111001101011011001010010000001110011011001010110 10010110111000100000011101100110010101110010011011 01011101010111010001101100011010010110001101101000 00100000011001010110100101101110011001010110111000 10000001010100011011110111000001100110001000000110 00010110111000100000010100110110001101101000011001 0101101001110111110110010100101110

Re:My 2 cents

[tempfile]

Actually, it means
"I thinking be probably a pot of slice".

Ershlap?

[paul248]

Abdook artelly oppetrom uplocty?! Astenboorsley... af arcoolodople!

Bli, Fal.

Re:Ershlap?

[decipher_saint]

Are you my boss, 'cause you sound like him...

Am I fired yet?

Been there, done that

[User 956]

Gordon Rugg has demonstrated that it's possible to generate a text like the Voynich manuscript -- containing language-like regularities, despite being potentially meaningless

That's funny. I thought Darl McBride had already proven that with all those open letters he's written.

Mod me down, hippies!

so obvious

[segment]

Gordon Rugg has used the techniques of Elizabethan espionage to recreate the Voynich manuscript, which has stumped code-breakers and linguists for nearly a century

Had Mr Rugg just used rot13 he would've cracked the code long ago. Want Crypto?

Looks like things haven't changed in 500 years!

[a-aiyar]

Lets see - it turns out that the Voynich manuscript is likely a bunch of drivel that pictures of naked women. Looks like we haven't come that far since it was written, as this Filipino edition of FHM would suggest!

Anyone else get the feeling...

[carambola5]

Does anyone else get the feeling that these people are just saying "It's too hard. We give up" ?

From the article...

[aztektum]

To prove that the manuscript is a hoax, one would need to produce entire sections using this technique, says Pelling. Tweaking the grilles and tables should make this possible, reckons Rugg.

It's called a Xerox machine man.

Re:Beale Papers

[Lispy]

Wow, now I know whats my quest in 2004....The Treasure is mine...;-)

Codebreak this!

[crazyhorse44]

Gue sepak biji lu!

The Voynich manuscript

[t0ny]

Have they tried casting "Read Magic" on it?

You can't permenantly do that

[porkchop_d_clown]

you see, new suckers are being born every minute.

Re:It's one thing to say something is a hoax...

[poot_rootbeer]

If he had found a truly elegant proof of the general case, and believed it was true, why not pose the general challenge?

hmm... because the margins were too small to pose it in?

Repetitions in the Text

[wintermute1974]

Its text contains features found in no known language: for instance, its commonest words may be repeated two or three times in succession.
Source: http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/cs/staff/g.rugg/voyni ch/index.html

It is very, very, very unlikely that common words would be repeated again and again and again unless someone really, really, really wanted to.

I've cracked it!

[RealRav]

I've cracked it and will gladly give over the translation for 600 ducats.

Dreams are better as dreams than reality.