[split] Authority and the Appeal to it.

[Koen G]

RadioFM: if I ever wanted to do any research that really depends on the scribes, I would simply call them five hands and treat them as hypothetical. Unless I develop a Theory™, the difference between five people and one person will not matter to me. I can't imagine one good reason why this question should come into play for statistical analysis.

Five scribes have been proposed by Lisa, that's a fact. One can refer to that fact, if it is relevant, without needing to fake expertise. For example: "This study found no significant difference between the entropy values of sections of the text belonging to the five scribes proposed by Davis (ref)." Without adding "andthussheiswrongandiamrightanditwasjusttheonebadhombreallalongwoohootheoryisbackonthemenuboys!"

Of course, if I ever wanted to study the handwriting myself and come up with a competing classification, that would change things. But why would I do that?

About older experts: science is generally better now than it was 100 years ago. And what you mention wasn't a peer-reviewed article. I would love to see another paleographer publishing their findings formally, then we could compare.