How many solutions did you create to get those 4 that have more words than the RG?

I wrote a program that explores a space of random solutions. Basically, it starts with something random, and gradually improves it until more and more words appear. Each time I run it, it generates a new solution that has more words in it than RG.

Gee, too bad with all those fancy computer programs you can’t find a solution. You must be doing something wrong. I think you make it too complicated.

I’m curious to know who you think might be doing it right!

How many solutions did you create to get those 4 that have more words than the RG?

I wrote a program that explores a space of random solutions. Basically, it starts with something random, and gradually improves it until more and more words appear. Each time I run it, it generates a new solution that has more words in it than RG.

So is it more like 100 runs to get those or a 1000 or 10, 000?

Graysmith and Ed did it with no computers just pen and paper.

Gee, too bad with all those fancy computer programs you can’t find a solution. You must be doing something wrong. I think you make it too complicated.

I’m curious to know who you think might be doing it right!

Me too.

Graysmith’s looks as good as anything I’ve seen. In spite of computer programs. Of course we put a man on the moon with slide rules, before hand held calculators were invented. Oh, let us step back now, ye geeks and code solvers, take a shower or a nap. And think global today about these ciphers. There is a message and a name.
He who solves this code, could find the true Zodiac Killer. You must first create the key, before you can create a cipher. What is the key?

So is it more like 100 runs to get those or a 1000 or 10, 000? Graysmith and Ed did it with no computers just pen and paper.

Each run starts with a bad solution then works at it until it has a lot of words in it. Are you suggesting Graysmith did not do something similar?

So is it more like 100 runs to get those or a 1000 or 10, 000? Graysmith and Ed did it with no computers just pen and paper.

Each run starts with a bad solution then works at it until it has a lot of words in it. Are you suggesting Graysmith did not do something similar?

There is a big difference between a person with pen and paper making a hundred starts over a year and a compter which does a hundred starts every second! And your program is looking for vertical, diagonal and backwards words, Graysmith and O’Neil were not.

Among the group of proposed solutions do you have an explanation as to why the RG is such an outlier?

Among the group of proposed solutions do you have an explanation as to why the RG is such an outlier?

As I’ve explained, it’s because it’s a tiny sample of solutions that isn’t representative of the space of possible solutions. And since you don’t know what the distribution is, you don’t know what the expected variance is.

Think of all samples of solutions fitting into a bell curve. If the bell is narrow, then 50% higher than the average is significant, since few samples will be in that area. But if the bell is wide, 50% higher than the average will still fall well within its girth, so many samples will still be higher.

There is a big difference between a person with pen and paper making a hundred starts over a year and a compter which does a hundred starts every second! And your program is looking for vertical, diagonal and backwards words, Graysmith and O’Neil were not.

Indeed – and since the program is finding so many similar solutions, it’s easier to understand how Graysmith arrived at one so easily.

solution (can be) is from 5 444, line 17 to line 17.1 to 20. (above alternating with low)
symbols in geometric form = its opposite, ie same letter
symbols letters reversed (reversed = the letter itself, the normal font = your mirror in the alphabet eg B = N) and etc and will
is complicated but it was fun

Just an observation but I have to say that I have issue with many, if not most, of the word search words that you consider "relevant", AK.

All the proposed solutions total words, Zodiac/Crime relevant:

Cecil: 60, 4 (FAKE, FAKERS, MAIL, FATE)
Starliper: 39, 4 (TIME, HELP, EVIL, LIED)
Kracik: 39, 3 (DEAL, SINS, LIED)
Trav1st: 42, 5 (SEEN, DATE, SHOT, SECT, HINT)
Lathers: 46, 4 (LANE, TIED, SINS, LASS)
Turkmen: 49, 2 (LIES, FOIL)
Raw Graysmith: 69, 11 (BOMBS, SLASH, TELL, LIES, DUEL, GAME, LIST, BOMB, TIES, BARS, LASS)

Fake? Fate? Time? Deal? Sect? Seen? Hint? Foil?
Tell? Duel? Bars?

Are any of these necessarily crime-related much less relevant to the Zodiac case?

I’ll give you that the Graysmith solution seems to generate more words and even more vaguely Z-related words but it would seem to me that Z certainly could have generated more specific case-related words (and longer than 5 letter words) if he was truly trying to create a word search here. Compare the results to the BTK word search puzzle, which clearly WAS a word search puzzle. It also really conveys no information whatsoever but I guess you could make the case that the 408 solution didn’t either. At least there was a message conveyed in that solution, even if it was entirely unhelpful.

I think that beyond the obvious subjectivity of trying to decide what words are "Zodiac/Crime Relevant" – which I believe is a ridiculous and futile exercise – I don’t believe that AK has a real grasp
of the magnitude of what we are looking at here.

The 340 cipher contains 63 unique symbols, each of which can represent any of the 26 letters from A through Z.
So that means the number of possible "solutions" or arrangements of letters in the key is 26^63. That’s a very large number. Mind-bogglingly large.
According to Wolfram Alpha that number is slightly above 139 octovigintillion, which is also about 1.4 billion times the number of atoms in the known universe.

So when AK says to take the Graysmith "solution" and compare it against 6 other "solutions" it is just a preposterous excuse of an experiment. It is just the same as saying "out of all of the atoms
in the known universe, let’s ignore most of them, and only look at these 6." That’s just absurd. It’s laughable.

Right at the start of this thread in the second post – AK says: (text bolded by me)

Not only does this proposed solution give clear words like I GIVE THEM HELL TOO, SEE A NAME and THESE FOOLSHALL SEE, I also discovered that key Zodiac words like LIST and BOMBS appear diagonally! To me that is absolute confirmation that this is the intended first stage solution of the 340. It is impossible that key words Zodiac used would appear by accident like that, together, correct spelling, no anagrams. We also see THEO, which is Greek for GOD, and on a vertical downward under the "M" in BOMBS we see DEO, which is Latin for GOD.

Dave has already shown 4 different key arrangements of the 340 that produce more words (even "Zodiac/Crime Relevant" ones) that the Graysmith "solution."

AK – How many of those sort of examples would you need to see to in order to realize that the Graysmith isn’t special at all? 100? 10,000? A billion? Six trillion?
Because in comparison to all of the possible key arrangements, those are actually small numbers.

-glurk

Graysmith’s looks as good as anything I’ve seen.

I believe you. And I agree. It’s also as bad as anything I’ve seen. These little experiments (even though more than a slide rule was required) should really be enough to convince people that these types of "solutions" are invalid or at the very least, impossible to prove. The FBI and LE understand that all too well. That is why these "solutions" have been rejected – they are wrong or useless.

Interesting statistical information. And yet someone managed to decipher the 480. What are the mathematical calculations for the possibilities of the 480?
The bottom line is the codes are meant to be deciphered, that they contain a message. You must first create the key. The key is more simple than you
are trying to make it.

The key is more simple than you are trying to make it.

The answer is always simple when you know what it is. But I don’t think you know what it is.