RE: VMs: [ha] [hb] not different languages

["GC" <glenclaston@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Rene wrote:

> I'm still curious. In this figure of 50%, do
> you count the word 8AM / daiin once, or each time
> that it occurs (and similar for all other frequent
> words).

In this figure I would be counting 8am each time it occurs.  Obviously there
are other ways to look at this section, but for my layout purposes and
attempting to deterine if there was any pattern to the order the words were
set on page, this was appropriate.  Here's a rundown of the figures I'm
using:

(These figures include 17 words which contain unreadable glyphs, 14 in [ha]
folios and 3 in [hb] folios)

111 folios in herbal section
86 [ha] folios
25 [hb] folios

total words in herbal section             9,764
total shared between [ha] and [hb]        5,038

- Words counted each time they occur -

Total words in [ha]                       7,036
Total shared words in [ha]                3,549  (50.44%)
Total non-shared words in [ha]            3,487  (49.56%)
total words that occur only once in [ha]  1,721  (24.46%)

Total words in [hb]                       2,728
total shared words in [hb]                1,489  (54.58%)
total non-shared words in [hb]            1,239  (45.42%)
total words that occur only once in [hb]    715  (26.21%)


- Words counted only once  (unique sort) -

total unique words in both sections       3,365
total words that occur only once          2,436
total unique words in [ha]                2,528
total unique words in [hb]                1,225
Total unique shared words                   388

Very interesting responses, Rene.  Gives me something to think about and
respond to, which I'll try to do this weekend.  Thanks for your feedback.

GC


> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx]On
> Behalf Of Rene Zandbergen
> Sent: Friday, August 01, 2003 4:48 AM
> To: vms-list@xxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: Re: VMs: [ha] [hb] not different languages
>
>
>
> --- GC <glenclaston@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> > Every once in a great while (every other day for me,
> > it seems), we make a
> > post that invites the slings and arrows of
> > outrageous fortune to rain down
> > upon us. Here is mine for the week.  (So it's been a
> > slow week, what can I say?)
>
> Happy to oblige :-)
>
> > Currier referred to statistical differences in the
> > Voynich as "languages",
> > and to writing style differences as "hands".
>
> Yes. Again, Currier was careful to point out that
> the term 'language' could be misleading, and he
> did not really intend language as in English vs.
> French.
>
> > I've fallen into Rene's classification scheme,
> > which identifies pages by their
> > sections and "language", making an Herbal page in
> > "language A" [ha], and an
> > Herbal page in "language B" [hb]. The [h] is for
> > "Herbal folio", the [a/b]
> > indicates the statistical "language"
>
> Like you, I've only looked at the 'language' issue,
> not the hands, since the former are easily captured
> in numbers we can manipulate and understand.
>
> > Rene sought to put a better face on it,
> > concluding (correct me if I'm wrong), that
> > these could not be a difference in actual
> > "language", but might instead reflect "dialect".
>
> Like many other things, I am really not sure.
> If the VMs is encoded using some kind of numbering
> scheme, then both the classifications language
> and dialect are misnomers. But it is always easy
> to compare with languages. For example, Spanish
> and Portuguese would differ more from each other
> than HA and HB language. OTOH, written
> British and American English would be closer to
> each other than HA and HB. (This requires a
> proper metric, but I think people understand
> what I mean). And I don't mean to imply that
> British and American English are two dialects :-)
>
> > Again I offer the challenge to anyone to find a
> > repetitive difference between the two "hands".
>
> It would require an expert.
> The only expert opinion we have is that it is by
> one and the same person. Currier thought differently,
> but he admitted that he's no expert.
>
> > In the Herbal section, as I've reported, we have
> > about 50% of the words shared between statistic
> > A [ha] pages and statistic B [hb] pages.  About 25%
> > of the words are common only to [ha] or [hb], and
> > the other 25% occur only once in the herbal section,
>
>
> I'm still curious. In this figure of 50%, do
> you count the word 8AM / daiin once, or each time
> that it occurs (and similar for all other frequent
> words).
>
> > Of the 25% of words exlusive to [ha] or [hb], all
> > you need do is write a
> > computer program to systematically change endings
> > based on the beginning of
> > the word, and you can produce [hb] pages from [ha],
> > or otherwise.  That's
> > not a "dialect" in any sense I understand the term.
>
> It is a very interesting statement you are making
> here.
> It does require a demonstration of course,
> or a counter-example, but this effort will
> certainly lead to new insights.
> At the same time, changing HA-words into HB
> words will not make HA language into HB language,
> in the Currier sense of the word.
> How about introducing another acronym here:
> CL for Currier Language. This acronym is
> suggestive of class or classification, which is
> also quite appropriate.
> Anyway, word frequencies (word-initial character
> sequences) are not the same in HA and HB, and
> also different in other areas. Still: very,
> very interesting indeed.
>
> > The differences between the two are not that
> > numerous, and through a little
> > study they can all be matched up.  What's
> > interesting is that for every
> > ending in [hb], there seem to be at least two
> > endings in [ha] that match up.
> > The assumption that [hb] is a later language comes
> > to mind, given the order
> > of the folio presentation, which would make this
> > situation an "adaptation"
> > on the part of the author.  In [hb] for instance,
> > c89 occurs 333 out of 335
> > times.
>
> It is very frequent, but there is also the
> distinction between c89 and cc89 (many words
> differ only by that much).
>
> > Pages of raw data and evidentiary conclusions will
> > be forthcoming, in an
> > imagery I can deal with apart from the text base of
> > this list.
>
> Looking forward, though 'pages of raw data' may
> be hard to digest...
>
> > ...  we can exclude the phrase "dialect" from our
> > discussion of [ha/hb] as statistical entities, and
> > once and for all conclude
> > that these are not different "languages" at all,
> > rather variations based on
> > rather strict rules of substitution.
>
> Another valiant attempt to eradicate a misnomer
> or correct outdated information for once and
> forever!
> There will be future books about the
> Voynich MS where Marci is called Rudolph's
> physician (and one day I will learn to spell
> the emperor's name correctly :-) ) and the
> legendary author of the Voynich MS will still be
> called Francis Bacon.
> We can only keep trying.
>
> Cheers, Rene
>
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