Something I have been reading and thinking about lately.
Where it started: Numberphile is an amusing website of math
related videos.
First - video: Numberphile – on YouTube. This one is looking
at an Enigma machines and the math behind it. Also some tangents about other
things. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2_Q9FoD-oQ
Second - video: further information about Enigma, and the
math, and some exploration of the men worked on breaking Enigma. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4V2bpZlqx8
Third - video: this looks less at Enigma specifically and
more at cryptography in general. I will let the video speak for itself. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2_Q9FoD-oQ
There are a handful of other tangentially related videos on
the ‘also watch’ list for this video, of varying quality and information. Feel free
to browse.
For further cipher machines and the efforts to decrypt them,
look for the ‘Lorenz cipher’ and the ‘Colossus machine.’ Also ‘Purple’, and ‘Ultra’
ciphers. Most all of these came before or during WWII.
Forth – book: the third video references this book. “The Code
Book” by Simon Singh. http://www.amazon.com/Code-Book-Science-Secrecy-Cryptography/dp/0385495323/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1423511484&sr=1-1&keywords=the+code+book
I found this book first at the library, and then popped for
a copy from Amazon. It is very interesting in its discussion of cryptography,
and telling a brief overview of the history of the subject. Some parts of it
you may need to chew on to get through.
Many of the ideas that the book addressed are in the above
third video.
-
Cipher shifting, where you scramble the alphabet by moving
the whole alphabet x characters in a given direction. Related are all the
variations possible for a given alphabet (in this case it concentrates on the
Roman alphabet.)
-
Frequency analysis of the characters in a given
alphabet, and comparison of the frequency of the characters in an encrypted
message. The output of this idea is not unfamiliar to “Wheel Watchers.” Thought
never mentioned in the book, “Wheel of Fortune” contestants use this frequency
analysis in its puzzles. ‘R,’ ‘S,’ ‘T,’ ‘L,’ and I’d like to buy a vowel ‘E.’
-
Mechanical ciphering, where a machine is used to encrypt
the message. Enigma gets the spotlight, but Lorenz, Ultra and Purple get some
mention.
-
Language ciphering, where instead of using the same
language or character set to encode the message, you switch to a completely
different one. This is much harder to do mechanically, with analogue machines.
-
Digital ciphers and public encryption with private
keys. This is one area that was only theoretical until the technology caught up
to it. Read the book for more, as there is no way I can begin to describe it.
There are a handful of names that show up in this book that
have a bunch of influence in other things, and a few that do not get their just
due.
Notables on Ciphering
Vigenére – developed the concept of cipher shifting beyond
using a single shifted alphabet.
Babbage, Kasiski – defeated the Vigenére cipher. Babbage also
developed the concepts of a programmable machine, in ‘Difference Engine #2.’
Notables on mechanical ciphering.
Marconi – developed the radio, requiring the spreading of Morse
code. (An open key cipher)
Scherbius – developed the Enigma machine, and built the
company that made them.
Rejewski – first broke the Enigma for Poland before
the war started, building off of French intelligence. Developed a technique to
break the code from which he developed the design of and built the first bombe,
in Poland .
Turing – built on Rejewski’s work after the fall of Poland , and improved
the bombe.
Peripherally involved in the construction of Colossus. Developed
the principles for the architecture of the modern computer, knowingly or not
echoing and expanding on ‘Difference Engine #2.’
Notables on language ciphering
Young – linguist who began cracking open hieroglyphics, from
the Rosetta stone among other sources.
Champollion – archeologist who built on Young’s work to
reestablish Hieroglyphics, and developed further principles for translating
lost languages.
(A whole group of people who cracked and opened up Linear
B.)
Notables on Digital Ciphers
A whole group of people exploring new ways to encode and
decode information, particularly with the advent of digital computers.
This stream of though pools with another that is sourced
around John Von Neumann. I will leave exploring that for another posting.
One side note:
The Prophet Joseph Smith and the translation of languages. The traditional
and held to statement is he accomplished the work of translating the Book of
Mormon by the gift and power of God. But many wonder as to the actual mechanics
involved. I am not going to begin to explore this.
Rather looking at the above principles of ciphers and decoding, I am curious how
long it took him to learn and read the language on the plates? Not addressing
the process, just the accomplishment. Then building from that reservoir of
knowledge, how hard was it to begin to translate the scrolls that came into
possession of him and others in Kirtland Ohio ,
in about 1835?
The Book of Mormon tells us that the language on the plates
was a 1000+/- years removed variation of Reformed Egyptian. Also this language
was had in its original on the Brass Plates that Nephi originally took at the
start.
Nephi was in Jerusalem
in 600 B.C. The written Egyptian languages at the time were hieroglyphic,
hieratic and demotic. Hieratic was a shorthand or lowercase of hieroglyphics,
that was initially common use and later moved to being primarily used by the
priest-caste. Demotic was developed about 660 B.C. and used everywhere hieratic
was not.
Question: which script were the Brass Plates written in?
Answer: we don’t know.
Question: which script was the Nephite variant Reformed
Egyptian based on?
Answer: we don’t know.
Question: what language was on the scrolls that came into
the possession of Joseph Smith and others in Kirtland?”
Answer: I do not know. Scholars who have access the remnants
may know. But this gets to my point: I think that Joseph Smith had enough
memory of the language on the plates, to pick up similar characters on the
scrolls, and thus have an easier time of translating them into what we have of
the texts.
Tangent: What all was on the scrolls? Answer: Go ask John
Gee at F.A.R.M.S. http://publications.maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/review/20/1/S00009-5176a4d94ae9e10Gee.pdf
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