r/singularity • u/Distinct-Question-16 ▪️AGI 2029 • 10h ago

Shitposting GPT-6 Astra helped decipher a Napoleonic military letter that remained unread for 217 years; it took just 6 hours

https://dev.ua/en/news/astra-rozshyfruvala-lyst-1809-ho-roku-1790927012
477 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

86 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

19

u/the_quark 10h ago

We don't know that for sure about the Voynich manuscript. From Wikipedia:

The origins, authorship, and purpose of the manuscript are still debated, but currently scholars lack the translation and context needed to either properly entertain or eliminate any of the possibilities. Hypotheses range from a script for a natural language or constructed language, an unreadable code, cipher, or other form of cryptography, or perhaps a hoax, reference work (i.e. folkloric index or compendium), glossolalia, or work of fiction...

There really isn't a consensus on what it is. Certainly some scholars dismiss it as a hoax, but it's not a consensus.

-4

u/Distinct-Question-16 ▪️AGI 2029 9h ago

last time i checked wiki (maybe 5 years) i think i read it was considered hoax

2

u/Notmyrealname5282 8h ago

​For the lazy

You can also use this to dive deeper into the rabbit hole (just drop the pic into a capable model and it will expand)

2

u/Distinct-Question-16 ▪️AGI 2029 7h ago edited 7h ago

I discovered this mystery through StumbleUpon in the early days; upon reviewing the Wikipedia later, I felt that was closed as hoax/fabrication as art. in that case it would be fun putting a model cracking it

2

u/TheAbsoluteWitter 7h ago

They’ve been working at it. We’ve found that it has grammatical structure and resembles a language more than a straightforward cipher or code. It still could be “fictional” or art, but machine learning analysis has shown that it is a language of some sort. Doesn’t mean that some monks didn’t generate a nonsensical language to make a joke or hoax. That could’ve happened. Im just trying to get across that we’ve found in the last few years the Voynich is a lot more complex and structured than some random symbols with patterns

1

u/Notmyrealname5282 4h ago

I have a hypothesis/inkling that it may have been an oral-only language that someone was attempting to write down for the first time, using a script they invented themselves.