Talk:Opposition by Judaism to evolutionary theory

message: The Discovery Institute is a Seattle-based "think tank" that is dedicated to intelligent design has several Jewish fellows. Their occasional publications might give the impression that there is widespread Jewish support for theories of intelligent design, as opposed to theistic evolution. --Metzenberg 09:43, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Discovery Institute 

message: Cantor, Geoffrey and Marc Swetlitz, (editors). Jewish Tradition and the Challenge of Darwinism. University of Chicago Press. 2006. ISBN: 9780226092768
PART 1: HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES ON JEWISH RESPONSES TO EVOLUTION
* Introduction to Part 1
* Chapter 1. "Anglo-Jewish Responses to Evolution," by Geoffrey Cantor
* Chapter 2. "Responses to Evolution by Reform, Conservative, and Reconstructionist Rabbis in Twentieth-Century America," by Marc Swetlitz
* Chapter 3. "Practically, I Am a Fundamentalist: Twentieth-Century Orthodox Jews Contend with Evolution and Its Implications," by Ira Robinson
 
PART 2: SOCIAL USES OF EVOLUTION: ANTI-SEMITISM, RACISM, AND ZIONISM
* Introduction to Part 2
* Chapter 4. "The Impact of Social Darwinism on Anti-Semitic Ideology in Germany and Austria, 1860-1945," by Richard Weikart
* Chapter 5. "The Evolution of Jewish Identity: Ignaz Zollschan between Jewish and Aryan Race Theories, 1910-1945," by Paul Weindling
* Chapter 6. "Zionism, Race, and Eugenics," by Raphael Falk
 
PART 3: EVOLUTION AND CONTEMPORARY JUDAISM
* Introduction to Part 3
* Chapter 7. "Crisis Management via Biblical Interpretation: Fundamentalism, Modern Orthodoxy, and Genesis," by Shai Cherry
* Chapter 8. "Torah and Madda? Evolution in the Jewish Educational Context," by Rena Selya
* Chapter 9. "Modern Orthodoxy and Evolution: The Models of Rabbi J. B. Soloveitchik and Rabbi A. I. Kook," by Carl Feit
* Chapter 10. "The Order of Creation and the Emerging God: Evolution and Divine Action in the Natural World," by Lawrence Troster
I have reproduced the Table of Contents here. This book looks like it will help us out greatly in improving this article. --Metzenberg 23:16, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  University of Chicago Press, new book (November 2006) 

message: :Please reply to these statements at This entry to prevent parralell discussions on the same topic.
Re:
*Judaism and evolution 
*Jewish opposition to evolution
*Jewish reactions to intelligent design
These three need direction, focus and agreemment.
What purpose do these articles serve? Are they titled to accurately represent their topic? Are they able to be Neutral and Appropriately sourced encyclopedic articles.
Judaism and evolution in particular seems as much about Judaic creationism and Judaic philosophy on the origin of life and the universe.--ZayZayEM 09:29, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  My response to ZayZayEM is located at Talk:Jewish reactions to intelligent design. Please respond there if you wish to. --Metzenberg 21:13, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Relationship of Jewish and evolution/creationism articles 

message: My issues with this article are not quite {NPOV}.
They are mostly involved with Tone, Defining the topic, Staying on Topic, and Clarity.
*Illustrations
**Rabbi - makes sense, needs caption illustrating relevance to topic
**Rabbi's book - sort of makes sense, needs caption illustraing relevance to topic
**Monkey - libellous, pov, misinforming, ditracting, NOT okay
**Natan's book - relevant, needs caption illustarting relevance
*Lead paragraph.
**needs to first define topic and article scope, this is its primary function
**should provide a small summary of entire view spectrum of opposition to evolution, allowing a user to read it, feel informed, and then decide whether or not they want to find out more of teh details
**must provide a link (and possible short statement) to other views on evolution by Jewish international community
***must state which view is majority, and faction affiliation of view spectrum
*Overuse and overrepresentation of quotes. Stating something about Jewish views and then quoting one rabbi's statements seems overrepresentation to me. Eg:
**Judaism has no creed or catechism that prescribes normative beliefs about evolution, or any other matter. In his Guide to the Perplexed, the medieval Sephardic rabbi Maimonides stated, "what the Torah writes about the account of creation is not all to be taken literally."
*This may be a result of my unfamiliarity with the subject. This is something I want checked by independent third parties.
:::: ZayZayEM.  Good example why you just don't belong here.  Maimonides was one of the three most important rabbis of the Rishonim (the first commentators).  He is reverred by all Jews today, as one of the great commentators from the Middle Ages.  You are here talking about materials that you know nothing about.  You are here to disrupt, as a stalker, not to make a contribution to this page.  --216.89.203.226 18:46, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You have made a point that Judaism has no central authority. This is contradicting your earlier claims. Please calm down more. And cease ad hominem attacks. (Branding me as a stalker allegedly invalidates my arguments). Please pay attention that almost every use you have asked to look at this page has expressed concern over your contributions as well as mine.--ZayZayEM 08:35, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reasons for {noncompliant} 

message: ZayZayEM, 
Essentially, you have spent several days stalking me.  The record of that is these talk pages, this one, and the ones that it is attached to, where you have been obsessively following me.  Every time I made a change, you were there often just a few minutes later trying to modify it.  If I wrote a caption for a picture, you would want to re-write it. If I put a picture on the left side, you would want it on the right side. I would write a paragraph, and immediately you would want to rearrange it, put it somewhere else. You followed me from one page that I was working on to another, to another. What you are doing is cyberstalking.
I felt like you were looking over my shoulder constantly as I was writing.  You are not here to contribute. You simply want somebody to squabble with. You constantly quote Wikipedia policies and procedures to me.  Suddenly I am forced to spend all my time trying to answer ZayZayEM.  We had edit conflicts (where I would try to save the page, and it would turn out I couldn't because he had just saved the page in the time since I had done it).  Normally, that never happens to me. He clearly wanted to draw me into some kind of edit war or procedure war.  I kept asking him to just leave, and come back later, if he felt that he had to edit my work.  But somehow, ZayZayEM felt that that was not acceptable.  He had to be there in real time editing and changing what I was doing while I was doing it. 
ZayZayEM, you don't have the knowledge or ability to be editing in these areas.  While Wikipedia is the encyclopedia that anybody can edit, that doesn't mean it is the encyclopedia that anybody should edit.  Why is it that you, a 21-year-old Australian biomedical student, who knows nothing about Judaism and its philosophy and theology, are so concerned with what is on this page? 
You are not here to work on substantive editorial changes. There are 1.7 million pages on the English wikipedia.  Why do you have to be here to "improve" this page. You are not improving it. You've come here to fight and cause problems.'''
:: Stalking is a form of mental assault, in which the perpetrator repeatedly, unwantedly, and disruptively breaks into the life-world of the victim, with whom he has no relationship (or no longer has)....Moreover, the separated acts that make up the intrusion cannot by themselves cause the mental abuse, but do taken together (cumulative effect).CyberStalking: menaced on the internet 
Your behavior is stalking. I now feel uncomfortable on Wikipedia because of your behavior. I now understand the feelings that many women have online ... they report constant personal interference by men if they use a recognizable female identity. I feel what they feel. I don't want to be working on wikipedia when there is an editor who is obsessed with my work following me around. 
Notes to above
--12.31.54.34 18:26, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  ZayZayEM is stalking! 

message: I started it, and now I agree with Shirahadasha that we should delete it. I have already moved the material to the Judaism and evolution page, to which I have also added new materials about other Orthodox Jewish opponents of Darwinian theory. On the Judaism and evolution, I put the Creationism section box beside this material.  Although I am not crazy about its Christian iconography, I think the subject of the whole section is really about the Judaic response to Christian creation theology. 
Shira left these comments on my user page, so rather than state my case for deleting the article, I will simply repeat hers. Because the article is currently locked, with the controversy underway, I am unable to open the deletion debate.  I would like to ask an administrator who is able to do so to begin the process: --Metzenberg 01:31, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I may not agree with User:ZayZayEM on everything, but I am inclined to agree that Jewish opposition to evolution is a POV fork of Judaism and evolution and I also agree that Judaism and evolution is the more NPOV title and hence Jewish opposition to evolution should be merged into it. ZayZayEM's simply right on this one. I'm not sure I'm convinced by the arguments that Jewish reactions to Intelligent Design should also be merged, but the arguments, although a little strongly made, generally seem plausible and legit arguments, right or wrong, rather than any sort of disruptive activity. I understand the edit history may show a different story. --Shirahadasha 00:49, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't believe that Jewish opposition to evolution is being presented badly or in a POV way. The problem I see is that having a separate article devoted to a specific POV in a controversy represents a WP:POVFORK. I don't see why Haredi opposition to evolution can't be presented in the more general article. I realize in many cases I've argued that different denominational approaches to religious issues represent distinct subjects deserving distinct articles. Here, however, I think they aren't. In general, I think that a denomination's approaches to distinctly religious subjects represesnts a subject within that denomination rather than a point of view about something external (So, for example, Conservative Halakha is a subject intrinsic to Conservative Judaism rather than a mere Conservative point of view on a subject external to Conservative Judaism). Here, however, we are dealing with a religious denomination's perspective on a secular subject that comes from outside the denomination. For this reason, I believe that Haredi Judaism's view of evolution is simply a POV about evolution, not a distinct subject intrinsic to Haredi Judaism. Accordingly, I believe it belongs with the other POVs and doesn't deserve a separate article. It's OK to have a separate article on Jewish POVs, but WP:POVFORK prohibits a separate article on only POVs that are opposed.  --Shirahadasha 02:47, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

text: Just a small note: Moving the content to another page will not resolve discussions on other issues with article tone and style. It does mean WP:POVFORK isn't a problem anymore. Hooray.--ZayZayEM 01:37, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  So, you know all the Wikipedia policies and procedures. And we seem to be agreeing about this now. How do you propose this article for merger into the other one?  (It has already happened.) --Metzenberg 21:36, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  I am proposing now that we delete this article 

message: Why is there a long string of bold text in the beginning?  Doesn't seem necessary.  The Behnam 08:20, 31 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Bold text is used to highlight the first mentioning of the article. I have been asked not to edit text content that I don't have topical familiarity with. If you can word the lead better Please do. And try and keep an emboldened piece of text outlining article topic.--ZayZayEM 01:44, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bold text 

message: I haven't read the article yet, but I find the title striking and subtly offensive. I think Jewish opposition to the theory of evolution or "...evolutionary theory" would be much better. Right now it sounds like we Jews just refuse to evolve. --Eliyak T·C 08:41, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article title 

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BetacommandBot 11:29, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Fair use rationale for Image:Slifkin creation.jpg