Editing Bible code (section)

===Replies to MBBK's criticisms===
====Harold Gans====

Harold Gans, a former [[cryptanalyst]] at the [[National Security Agency]], argued that MBBK's hypothesis implies a conspiracy between WRR and their co-contributors to fraudulently tune the appellations in advance. Gans argues that the conspiracy must include Doron Witztum, Eliyahu Rips, and S. Z. Havlin, because they all say Havlin compiled the appellations independently. Gans argues further that such a conspiracy must include the multiple rabbis who have written a letter confirming the accuracy of Havlin's list. Finally, argues Gans, such a conspiracy must also include the multiple participants of the cities experiment conducted by Gans (which includes Gans himself). Gans concludes that "the number of people necessarily involved in [the conspiracy] will stretch the credulity of any reasonable person."<ref>{{cite web |author=H. J. Gans. |url=http://www.aish.com/seminars/discovery/Codes/Primer/primer1.htm |title=A Primer on the Torah Codes Controversy for Laymen (part 1) |publisher= aish.com |access-date=April 7, 2008| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20080318163420/http://www.aish.com/seminars/discovery/Codes/Primer/primer1.htm| archive-date= March 18, 2008 | url-status= live}}</ref> Gans further argued that while "the mathematical issues are difficult for non-mathematicians to comprehend, I can summarize as follows: Professor McKay and his colleagues never claimed to have discovered real codes in those non-Torah texts. Their only "successful" results were obtained by deliberately rigging the experiment in such a way that the layman wouldn't recognize the mathematical flaws."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://jewishaction.com/jewish-world/people/up_close_with_harold_gans/|title=Up Close with Harold Gans|date=September 2, 2007|website=Jewish Action}}</ref>

Brendan McKay has replied that he and his colleagues have never accused Havlin or Gans of participating in a conspiracy. Instead, says McKay, Havlin likely did what WRR's early preprints stated he did, in providing "valuable advices". Similarly, McKay accepts Gans's statements that Gans did not prepare the data for his cities experiment himself. McKay concludes that "there is only ONE person who needs to have been involved in knowing fakery, and a handful of his disciples who must be involved in the cover-up (perhaps with good intent)."<ref>{{cite web |author=B. McKay |year=2003 |url=http://cs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/codes/StatSci/gans_rep.html |title=Brief notes on Gans Primer |publisher=cs.anu.edu.au |access-date=April 7, 2008}}</ref>

====WRR authors====

The WRR authors issued a series of responses regarding the claims of MBBK,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.torahcodes.co.il/debate1.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20010309025007/http://www.torahcodes.co.il/debate1.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=2001-03-09 |title=Refutations }}</ref> including the claim that no such tuning did or even could have taken place.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.torahcodes.co.il/havlin.htm |title=No such tuning |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071013123715/http://torahcodes.co.il/havlin.htm |archive-date=October 13, 2007 |df=mdy-all }}</ref> An earlier WRR response to a request by MBBK authors presented results from additional experiments that used the specific "alternate" name and date formats which MBBK suggested had been intentionally avoided by WRR.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.torahcodes.co.il/response.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/19980701070057/http://www.torahcodes.co.il/response.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=1998-07-01 |title=Response }}</ref> Using MBBK's alternates, the results WRR returned showed equivalent or better support for the existence of the codes, and so challenged the "wiggle room" assertion of MBBK. In the wake of the WRR response, author Bar-Natan issued a formal statement of non-response.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://cs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/dilugim/WNP/NoResponse.txt |title=Non-response |access-date=2010-05-02}}</ref> After a series of exchanges with McKay and Bar-Hillel, WRR author Witztum responded in a new paper<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.torahcodes.co.il/emanuel/eman_hb.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070205210241/http://www.torahcodes.co.il/emanuel/eman_hb.htm|title=New Statistical Evidence for a Genuine Code in Genesis|archive-date=February 5, 2007|website=www.torahcodes.co.il}}</ref> claiming that McKay had used smoke screen tactics in creating several [[straw man]] arguments, and thereby avoided the points made by WRR authors refuting MBBK.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.torahcodes.co.il/dat2_hb.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070209233127/http://www.torahcodes.co.il/dat2_hb.htm|title=Smoke Screen|archive-date=February 9, 2007|website=www.torahcodes.co.il}}</ref> Witztum also claimed that, upon interviewing a key independent expert contracted by McKay for the MBBK paper, some experiments performed for MBBK had validated, rather than refuted, the original WRR findings. Witzum questioned why MBBK had expunged these results. McKay replied to these claims.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://cs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/codes/StatSci/app_rep.html |title=Concerning Witztum's response to our article "Codes in War and Peace – a reply to Doron Witztum" |publisher=Cs.anu.edu.au |date=2001-06-15 |access-date=2010-05-02}}</ref>

No publication in a peer reviewed scientific journal has appeared refuting MBBK's paper. In 2006, four new Torah Codes papers were published at the [[IEEE Computer Society]]'s 18th International Conference on Pattern Recognition (ICPR'06).<ref>{{Cite journal|url=https://www.computer.org/csdl/proceedings/icpr/2006/12OmNApcuab|title=2006 18th International Conference on Pattern Recognition |date=August 8, 2006|volume=1|pages=i–iii|via=IEEE Xplore|doi=10.1109/ICPR.2006.10|url-access=subscription}}</ref>

====Robert Aumann====

[[Robert Aumann]], a [[game theory|game theorist]] and winner of the [[Nobel Prize in Economics]] in 2005, has followed the Bible code research and controversy for many years. He wrote:<ref>{{cite web |url=http://ratio.huji.ac.il/dp/dp_365.pdf |title=Analysis of the "Gans" Committee Report |access-date=2010-05-02 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060625075656/http://ratio.huji.ac.il/dp/dp_365.pdf |archive-date=June 25, 2006 |df=mdy-all }}</ref>

{{blockquote|Though the basic thesis of the research seems wildly improbable, for many years I thought that an ironclad case had been made for the codes; I did not see how 'cheating' could have been possible. Then came the work of the 'opponents' (see, for example, McKay, Bar-Natan, Bar-Hillel and Kalai, Statistical Science 14 (1999), 149–173). Though this work did not convince me that the data had been manipulated, it did convince me that it could have been; that manipulation was technically possible.}}

Following an analysis of the experiment and the dynamics of the controversy, stating for example that "almost everybody included [in the controversy] made up their mind early in the game", Aumann concluded:

{{blockquote|A priori, the thesis of the Codes research seems wildly improbable{{nbsp}}... Research conducted under my own supervision failed to confirm the existence of the codes – though it also did not establish their non-existence. So I must return to my a priori estimate, that the Codes phenomenon is improbable".<ref>^ Aumann, R.H., H. Furstenberg, I. Lapides, and D. Witztum (July 2004) (PDF). Analyses of the "Gans" Committee Report (#365). Center for the Study of Rationality, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. {{cite web |url=http://ratio.huji.ac.il/dp/dp_365.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=2010-05-02 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060625075656/http://ratio.huji.ac.il/dp/dp_365.pdf |archive-date=June 25, 2006 |df=mdy-all }}. Retrieved 2006-06-20.</ref>}}

====Robert Haralick====

[[Robert Haralick]], a Professor of Computer Science at the [[City University of New York]], has checked the Bible Code for many years and became convinced of its validity. He contributed a new experiment, checking whether, besides the minimal ELS – in which it was known that WRR's list was successful in Genesis and MBBK's list was successful in War and Peace – there were other, non-minimal ELSs where there is convergence between the rabbis' names and their respective dates. This had the effect of checking convergence found at 2nd minimal ELSs, 3rd minimal ELSs and so on. According to Haralick, the results were impressive; WRR's list was successful until the 20th minimal ELS, whereas MBBK's list failed after the 2nd minimal ELS.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Haralick |first=Robert M. |date=2003-10-29 |title=Torah Codes: Rudundant Encoding |url=https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=9884414ff8612a386b9419afc380680c5b3e05c5 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250523171535/https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=9884414ff8612a386b9419afc380680c5b3e05c5 |archive-date=2025-05-23 |access-date=2025-05-23 |publisher=City University of New York}}</ref> Haralick lectured on the subject in front of the participants of the International Conference on Pattern Recognition in 2006.<ref name=Torahcode>{{Cite web|url=http://torahcode.co.il/pdf_files/pub/har2.pdf|title=Testing The Torah Code Hypothesis: The Experimental Protocol}}</ref>