Saying “no” isn’t an argument.
Apologies, @coder1987, I’ve probably confused you. I was merely saying “no” to the assertion that I am expecting a description of the terrain to be found within the decoded plaintext. We already have that, of course, and in quite some detail.
“This isn’t right! It’s not even wrong!”—Wolfgang Pauli (1900–1958)
This is your strongest argument yet, and I want to acknowledge that. You’re reading the bomb mechanism sketch as an engineering specification — sensor B needs line-of-sight to sensor A, both need proximity to the road, the slope needs to face the right direction for sunlight, and the whole apparatus must be within a few meters of a passing bus. That’s a careful, functional reading of the sketch, and I respect it.
But you’re conflating two different questions.
The first question is: what does the cipher say? That’s answered by the constraint satisfaction analysis. 32 characters, three lock conditions, map bounds. The cipher gives coordinates.
The second question is: does the site at those coordinates have features consistent with what the Zodiac described in his letters? That’s a site survey question. And crucially, the paper doesn’t claim the triangle is the bomb. It claims the cipher points to this area, and something anomalous is there. Whether the micro-terrain six inches from the road satisfies every engineering detail of a bomb sketch drawn by a man who also admitted the design might not work — that’s a question for ground-penetrating radar and a site visit by authorities, not for satellite imagery and forum debate.
You’re essentially arguing: “I won’t accept coordinates unless I can verify the bomb’s trigger geometry from Google Earth.” That’s not a standard any 32-character cipher could meet. The cipher gets you to the road. The road is Lake Herman Road. The terrain matches the sketch at the macro level. What happens next requires people on the ground. If they find physical evidence connected to the Zodiac buried in the triangle, it is solved.
That’s a phone with a cracked screen, and you’re refusing to pick it up because it’s not in the exact room you expected.
I asked you for my phone, which doesn’t have a cracked screen, and very much is where I left it.
“This isn’t right! It’s not even wrong!”—Wolfgang Pauli (1900–1958)
