Re: VMs: Re: Word distribution

[Rene Zandbergen <r_zandbergen@xxxxxxxxx>]

--- Nick Pelling <incoming@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> > > I stand by my assertion (though it chimes with
> > > my own experience, I don't
> > > believe I originated it?) that the instance
> > > count of Voynichese words seems
> > > generally low compared with natural languages:
> > > and I also don't believe
> > > that Zipf's Laws are the right way to test this
> > > assertion.

[...]

> However, what I suspect happens differently in
> Voynichese is that which 
> your graphs don't capture for natural language (you
> only plot the most 
> important 4000 words, right?) - that there are very
> many more 
> single-instance words in Voynichese than in English
> texts.

Well, here we are in the unusual situation that
we can actually test this and settle it once and
for all.
I remember having had the same feeling (too many
words with single instance) and I remember having
tested it against a plain text, and I remember 
coming to the conclusion that the statistics of
the PT were similar to that of the VMs.
I don't have the numbers anymore, and I am not
sure what the PT language was. I am guessing 
Vulgate Latin. This is obviously significant.
As Gabriel points out: the length of the PT
is also relevant.

The impact of uncertain spaces is a bit harder
to test, but it can be done if there is a 
transcription available (in the interlinear) which
identifies them.

The point is: someone with a bit of time could
look at this, against various PT sources, and
come to a significant conclusion.

Cheers, Rene

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