Apparently, almost 400 years ago a manuscript came into existence that became known as the Voynich Manuscript. The MS is written in an unknown language by an unknown author in an unknown place. This book is a miniature encyclopedia that has baffled decipherers, cryptographers, and archaeologists for centuries. Even the best guesses at its true meaning and value have shortcomings that cause them to be instantly cast away.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript
There are nuances about the writing of the document that indicate that it is in fact a language, not a hoax, and probably contains useful information. There are sections about plants, stars, and other scientific topics.
Ironically, in my conjecture, I do not believe this document to be a work of science or mathematics at all, but instead a definitive guide to living off the land. That’s right, this is the world’s first documented nerd/hippy. The information present is information about food, medicine, navigation, and well-being, a Constitution by which the author drew up in his preparation of leaving society. The document is deliberately written in a unique language that escapes the bounds of society, and is unfortunately within itself schizophrenic.
I presume this guide is a complete work of fiction, incorporating ideas in combinations that have not been previously explored. This work is the quintessential literary piece as a critique against society as rebellious to language, the art of the renaissance, industrious city living, and embracing the natural earth, as she is an infinitely complex organism herself.
While authors struggle to write their definitive work and anticipate their deepest feelings to be unraveled through language and nuance, the Voynich Manuscript has instead made a work with indecipherable language that communicates directly with its observer, albeit highly dependent on illustration.
The existence of this work remaining a mystery for this many years only strengthens its value. When we fail to understand something it is frequent that we pose ourselves as looking for an answer to a question before us, instead of regarding what lies before us as an answer that needs a question. What manuscript could possibly need existence that contains information on plants, the cosmos, and biology. Simple, a vegan determined to live solely off the land in harmony with nature, and worried about getting lost.
Douglas Adams proposed this principle in his Hitchhiker series in a humorous manner. A super computer was created for the sole purpose of calculating the ultimate answer to life, the universe and everything. After completion, the computer (Deep Thought) began to process its only task. Eons later it arrived at a solution, only to have the people baffled by its meaninglessness. In vain, and scramble, they began to erect a computer that would calculate a question of life the universe and everything that would arrive at the conclusion “42.”
http://xkcd.com/593/
When I’ve browsed through the manual, a few years ago, the same realizations and perceptions of what you’ve described were within my mind.
Also, there were thoughts in me of a person who somehow walked through into his parallel neighboring world(which is ours), and had the book with him about his world, and perhaps somehow lost it during his travels.
The plants and things drawn within the manual/book, are ones which I tend to imagine are not ones found in this world…hence my thinking being lead to perceive an otherworldly nature.
However, the other thought within me about the book, is, maybe this person was a writer, and was making up a new world, something like perhaps in his/her time a ‘sci-fi’ novel in the works.
When I was in my younger years, alot of my creative inventive ideas were laughed at, picked on and scoffed at,.. and so, it was decided to invent a language to write all my ideas about. I wonder if this person was going through a similar matter in his/her time.
Glad to have stumbled onto this page of yours 🙂 thanks for making it exist.
Sooo crucialy 42=420 Marijuana is Life