Talk:Jewish reactions to intelligent design/Archive 1

message: I think it's appropriate to acknowledge one's biases and affiliations. I included the American Jewish Committee quote in my first version of this article. I am a member of that organization and a regular volunteer and participant in their programs, and I make a modest annual contribution. --Metzenberg 03:48, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Remember, we don't own the articles, so once you write it, it now belongs to everyone.  We'll edit it to the point that your original work may not resemble it's edited version.  I appreciate your disclaimer, but it doesn't really matter.  Orangemarlin 21:14, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  American Jewish Committee 

message: This lead needs work. It sounds like a lead to intelligent design not to Jewish reactions to intelligent design. It should clearly explain the scope of this article.--ZayZayEM 15:20, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Very good point. As you probably guessed, I wrote it with the perspective that it is linked from both Jewish and Intelligent Design topics. Maybe we give somebody else a chance to work on it. --Metzenberg 04:09, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  My main beef is that the lead doesn't even contain the word "Jewish reaction" or any attempt to make it clear that this article is about Jewish reactions. It should include a short summary, who the major players are, and why Jewish reactions are significant.--ZayZayEM 05:02, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

text: I changed the introduction for now. Again, I'll let somebody else go at it. --Metzenberg 08:24, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

text: ZayZayEM. I have restored the first paragraph giving an explanation of what intelligent design is. Don't forget that this article is not only referenced from pages about intelligent design. It is also referenced from pages about Judaism, Jewish political organizations, Jewish rabbis, etc. Remember that people who click into this article come here from different places. Indeed, some will come directly off the Internet, from Google. --Metzenberg 20:48, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That is why this is wiki. Peopleb can click on intelligent design and find all the information they want. Yes that article is long. But it has a lead. That is why leads should remain On Topic and succinct. It is superfluos.--ZayZayEM 00:56, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article lead needs wording 

message: In the same vein, I deleted a segment of text from the middle section because it did not seem to relate to Jewish reactions of any kind. --ZayZayEM 15:20, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry. I didn't realise tha Anti-Defamation League was a primarily Jewish protection agency.--ZayZayEM 00:49, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Boychik is it ever!  I'll try to figure out how to make that more clear. I think most Jews would probably agree that the two leading Jewish political organizations in the USA, not counting AIPAC (which is concerned with foreign affairs primarily), are the AJC and the ADL. So my choice of the two of them, as representing the mainstream of American Jewish opinion, is purposeful.  I would call the AJC the "liberal wing" and the ADL the "conservative wing" as mainstream Jewish political organizations. --Metzenberg 04:06, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Does this make this article leaning towards Americentrism? Why not an article on International Jewish responses to Creationism (ala the RCC one)--ZayZayEM 08:56, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

text:  Americentricism? Well can you think of any other country where the President or Prime Minister is mixed up with intelligent design theorists?  I can't think of anyplace else in the world where it is taken seriously enough that we have to fight against its inclusion in the public school curriculum. One more point ... most Jews in the world who do not live in Israel live in anglophone countries, and most anglophone Jews live in the United States. So bascially, it is an American political controversy.  --Metzenberg 09:20, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Your current comments betray your bias. Similar debacles involving politicians have arised in Australia, the UK, northern Europe, the Middle East and Africa. I think I have heard it mentioned in Japanese news as well.--ZayZayEM 00:58, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: A brief survey of the magazine rack at my local newsagent here in the suburbs of Canberra suggests that ID excites less interest, and occupies less rack-space, than, say UFOs. I think it's fair to say that the ID debate is exclusively for Americans. PiCo 08:46, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Not exclusively, primarily. I do not dispute this. I dispute that international views are irrelevant. Particularly when dealing with Jewish opinion - I would expect input from Israeli sources or reasons for lack of interest by Israeli parties. c.f statement regarding Islam/Turkey and ID.--ZayZayEM 09:21, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

text:  The Jewish communities in those places are much smaller and less influential. Can you give me some examples of organizations in these countries, and what they have said?  I think we would still be violating undue weight. The United States and Canada are the only two countries in the world, besides Israel, with large and influential Jewish populations (more than 2%, with significant participation of elected officials as well).  --Metzenberg 04:26, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Keep to topic

message: I'd like to find survey data of Jews in general, or of other Jewish professional organizations. Anybody know where to find one? --Metzenberg 04:18, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Survey of doctors 

message: These two links were on the original Judaism and evolution page, where this material was located before I started to develop it. I decided to remove the link, although I do think that David Klinghoffer is noteworthy enough for a wikipedia biography. 
*Darwin is a problem for Jews, David Klinghoffer, Jerusalem Post, April 18, 2006.
* Darwin’s Jews, David Klinghoffer, The Jewish Week, 02/24/2006 (A defense of Intelligent Design by David Klinghoffer, a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, the hub of the intelligent design movement)
David Klinghoffer is a columnist for the National Review (a conservative U.S. publication which is very noteworthy and respectable), and he is also the author of a book, Why the Jews Rejected Jesus, as well as a spiritual memoir, The Lord Will Gather Me In. David Klinghoffer works for the Discovery Institute.  To the best of my knowledge, he is a paid employee of the Discovery Institute, which is known to be funded by large Christian donors. His job with the Discovery Institute is to make it look like there are a lot of Jews out there that support Intelligent design, as well as to influence Jewish opinion. It's called public relations.  They pay him, and he writes stuff. --Metzenberg 05:09, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  David Klinghoffer 

message: ZayZayEM, since you claim the article is biased and POV, show me other materials that I have missed, or other points of view that I should have considered? All of the sources are available online, and every paragraph or section is documented. This was an American news story, commented on very heavily in the North American press, and by American Jewish organizations.  What is it that you as an Australian, apparently not even familiar with American Jewish organizations, would like to add to this article that is not here? Give me some examples! Or if you think that my sources are incorrect, or that I have interpreted them incorrectly, then show me how? Give me something substantial here, and we can then submit whatever your objections are to a request for comment.  --Metzenberg 08:34, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't get this discussion.  First of all, Intelligent design is a separate article from Creationism.  Both of those articles were written from the Christian perspective, and this is written from the Jewish ones.  I do not get the impression that Metzenberg thinks these articles are his.  Orangemarlin 23:00, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: My point is because this is a wiki people can click on intelligent design. We should definitely avoid trying to some such a massive idea in two sentances. If we do that people will think that that is all there is to the matter and not click on the wikilink. You cannot some up a concept as convoluted as ID in two sentances and remain NPOV. Wiki aims to solve this problem by allowing people unfamiliar with topics to be instantly (if they don"t have crappy dial-up) able to access that page.--ZayZayEM 01:28, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Apparently, you don't follow Intelligent design too closely.  I do.  It's a purely Christian outlook on the myth.  And a couple of times in the past when someone added something to any number of articles about Jewish views, it was written by a Christian (nothing wrong with that) who took one quote (and actually took that quote out of context) and used it to "prove" that all Jews believe in Intelligent design and Creationism.  This article is great.  It is a fork of more detail describing one of the Abrahamic religions viewpoint on Intelligent Design (and I suppose creationism).  This article is well-written, and represents an outstanding source for Jewish thoughts on Evolution.  To tell the truth, being Jewish, I never knew the "theology" (not really a word I'd use, but it's the best I can do) of Evolution and Creationism for Jews until I read these articles.  I don't care who wrote it, but I"m glad I don't have to read the exclusively US-biased, right wing Christian version of these beliefs.  Orangemarlin 15:58, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually as a young biomedicals cientist with interests in both education and ethics (i.e. scientific integrity) I do follow ID and do know that, in its primary form peddle by the DI, it is a Chrsitian outlook. I don't see what that has to do with my edits, the validity of this article or my concerns over this article's content. This article is not about Jewish thought on evolution (that article is Judaism and evolution and it's daughter Jewish opposition to evolution) this article is about Jewish reactions to intelligent design. I have learnt a lot from reading this article. But I can't help feeling a nagging suspicion of overrepresentation of certain views, geographical bias, and  original synthesis (the latter I have withdrawn my concern about, on this article). Please look at the Jewish opposition to evolution and it's history, particularly prior to my visitation. I understand it may have been  but User:Metz' comments and reversions seem that had I not intevened a rather different (and IMO flawed, misleading and distracting) article may have ensued. I stand by all my editing decisions and invokation of Wikipedia Policy (aside from my ADL deletion).--ZayZayEM 06:51, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ok ZayZayEM (from user Metzenberg) 

message: ZayZayEM, Why are you rearranging and editing material on the Talk page. I have no idea which Wikipedia policy that violates, but surely you do. For example, you have moved User:jayjg's comment to a different position on the page. He's an Admin.  Don't you think he knows where he wants to place his comments? --Metzenberg 01:10, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: User:MEtz. This is going to sound silly. But you are starting sound very paranoid. You keep making personal attacks on me. And I am really starting to feel uncomfortable discussing things with someone who doesn't seem to actually want to discuss anything (except about how right he is and how stupid I am). Please start acting maturely or I will repoprt you for wikistalking harrassment.--ZayZayEM 01:17, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  ZayZayEM, why are you rearranging Talk page? 

message: When Jews (Haredi or otherwise) who disagree with evolution discuss alternatives, are the alternatives they propose the same thing as what (largely Christian-influenced) thinkers mean by "intelligent design"? It's not clear to me that the article's current sourcing clearly establishes whether this is the case or not. People with strong views can sometimes be in danger of a false dichotomy situation where they can sometimes implicitly assume that all views opposed to their own or reaching superficially similar conclusions are completely the same. Similarly, it strikes me that views on the question of whether a topic should be taught in public schools may be a separate question, for some people, from whether they personally believe it, and it's possible these issues may be being conflated as well. Best, --Shirahadasha 20:59, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Shira, the article has been locked up now for days, but I already have a paragraph ready to add about Rabbi Avi Shafran and his views. I am choosing Shafran, because he appears to the be the most widely recognized spokesman for Agudath Israel. I think the quotation from him will broaden the articles perspective on this. BTW, I just finished creating a stub page for Shafran.  Have a look. --Metzenberg 21:40, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: User:Metz - you can utilise other wiki features to continue to provide information and possible versions of articles that are protected. Here are some suggestions of working space while this issue continues - User:Metzenberg/Sandbox, User:Metzenberg/Talk:Jewish reactions to intelligent design (proposed)--ZayZayEM 00:47, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible [[WP:OR]] issues regarding "Intelligent Design" 

message: Both User:ZayZayEM and User:Guettarda (who appears not to be a neutral administrator to me) agree to leave this whole series of pages behind and not do further editing here. There are 1.7 million other Wikipedia pages for you to contribute to. There are thousands of capable editors on wikipedia, several of whom are now interested in this page, and they can make further editorial changes. There are people now involved here who understand this material, like User:Jayjg, User:Shirahadasha, User:jmabel, and User:orangemarlin.  
* Do you, User:ZayZayEM, agree to leave these pages and not edit further? (yes or no)
* Do you, User:Guettarda, agree to leave these pages and not edit further? (yes or no)
Secondly, I ask ZayZayEM to agree from now on to use a different editorial style. From now on, you will not delete without first looking at the Talk for the page and the history of the page, to find out how long the material has been there, who added it, what it’s importance might be. 
* Do you, User:ZayZayEM, agree to this? (yes or no)
If you don’t understand material, but it has been on a page for a while and has already been viewed by others, will you assume that it is correct and that it belongs there. If the material is uncited or unsourced, will you tag it  instead of deleting it. 
* Do you, User:ZayZayEM, agree to this? (yes or no)
If you have questions about material that you don’t have expertise with, address a question to editors who do understand it, on the Talk page. Will you promise to work this way, from now on, on every page on Wikipedia where you are not yourself an expert with the material?
* Do you, User:ZayZayEM, agree to this? (yes or no)
Will you respect the opinions of those who actually author the material. They know what pictures, captions, headings, introductory text, and so forth really belong on the page. They are contributing it to the public domain, and they want other editors who work in and have expertise in the same area as themselves to be the ones that make comments and changes. Will you address questions to them on Talk pages, instead of acting without their permission? And if a writer requests that you leave a page for a period of time, so they can complete their work, will you do so?
* Do you, User:ZayZayEM, agree to this? (yes or no)
If User: Guettarda answers yes to question #1 and User:ZayZayEM answers yes to all of the questions, then I agree to withdraw my request for arbitration, and I consider this matter resolved. I will respectfully work with User:Jayjg, User:Shirahadasha, and User:orangemarlin, User:jmabel, and others to improve the pages. Indeed, I am excited about further collaboration with them and I am happy they have shown interest here. 
Obviously, I expect that I will have no further encounters with User:ZayZayEM on Wikipedia, since I am not interested in marsupials or Australia, and he is not interested in Judaism. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Metzenberg (talk • contribs) 
:Metzenberg, I'm not sure you have the right to ask these questions.  I think you're getting a little hostile to ZayZayEM's own hostility.  I'm supporting your efforts here, because I'm appalled at ZZM's edits, and flagrant violations of NPOV.  But all editors, you and me included, can deal with ZZM if necessary.  I'm not sure what his agenda might be, but tweaking you seems to be one of them.  Not very mature on his part, but I'd ignore him if I were you.  He's not worth the trouble.  You are making yourself look really bad.  Orangemarlin 15:42, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I think ZayZayEM and I have resolved what we disagreed on here. --Metzenberg 21:28, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Here is my proposal for a compromise: 

message: Not sure I want to get drawn into this war, but here's some suggestions that occur to me for the article:
1. The lead. Americancentrism is it's second name. The very first sentence reads: "The reaction of Jewish leaders and organizations to intelligent design has been primarily concerned with responding to proposals to include intelligent design in the public school curriculum as a rival scientific hypothesis to modern evolutionary theory." This is 100% Americana. It simply takes for granted that everyone will know that the Jewish leaders and organisations it mentions are American leaders and organisations; and proposals for the inclusion of ID in public school curriculum? Only in America, buddy. (The idea of including ID in school curricula in Australia was once raised by the Oz minister for education, a man notorious for having no beliefs, principles or loyalties of any description; he was immediately slapped down by his own Prime Minister). The next paragraph of the lead then goes on to discuss a court caase in the US, very important in that country, a non-event elsewhere.
::Over 1/3 of the world's Jews are in the U.S., and advocacy of "intelligent design" is largely U.S.-based. But if you have something on Jewish views on this in Australia, that would be a fine addition. - Jmabel | Talk 01:50, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Intelligent design is almost as American as all other religious efforts in infiltrating schools.  We can't help that Americans are obsessed with religion, but that's why this article exists.  Australian rules football rates an article, yet no one outside of Australia cares.  Orangemarlin 18:37, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Worldwide Jewish population:  about 13-14 million. How many don't live in either the USA or Canada or Israel?  Only about 3 million. Main countries that still have a few hundred thousand Jews are Russia, Ukraine, Argentina, France, United Kingdom. Jewish doctors are a professional group that is trained in evolutionary science.  Would be nice to find other professional groups that this affects, like teachers, scientists, but there tends not to be any survery data, unless somebody goes out and collects it. --Metzenberg 21:26, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

text:  It would be interesting if there are non-U.S. views to be found, but there are few countries in which advocacy of "intelligent design" has emerged as an important movement; certainly not Israel, the only other country with a comparable number of Jews. - Jmabel | Talk 01:50, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Since Judaism isn't centralized like Catholicism, viewpoints of where most Jews live is probably critical.  American Judaism is probably the only branch that has to deal with ID, so therefore it gets a lot more weight in this article.  Orangemarlin 18:37, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

text: Of the world's non-Orthodox, but practicing, Jews, over half are in the U.S., so U.S.-centrism is inevitable. - Jmabel | Talk 01:50, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  The sharpest dividing line in the spectrum of Jewish opinion is between Orthodox and non-Orthodox.  There are a substantial number of prominent Orthodox thinkers who oppose aspects of Darwinism, yet they generally oppose the concepts formulated by the Intelligent design movement in the USA. --Metzenberg 21:26, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

text:  I concur with Metzenberg. - Jmabel | Talk 01:50, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

text: I concur.  Orangemarlin 18:37, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

text:  It's a stub section right now. I was working on it when the article got locked.  He is one of several mainstream Orthodox scientists who strongly opposes intelligent design yet has some non-Darwinian beliefs about evolution. --Metzenberg 21:26, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

text:  On the order of 5% of the Jewish population in the USA, 10% in Israel, and a few percent elsewhere, but with a disproportionate leverage and influence, because of their political unity. --Metzenberg 21:26, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

text:  I concur with Metzenberg. - Jmabel | Talk 01:50, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

text:  It's not only that the issue is mostly an American one.  The non-Orthodox Jewish world is dominated by and heavily influenced by the American Jewish community.  Nowhere else (except perhaps in Canada, where the Jewish organizations are mostly affiliated with their larger American counterparts) is the Jewish community so large and influential. --Metzenberg 21:26, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Once again the problem isn't necessarily where the Jewish community is located, it is where it located that has to deal with this ID issue.  Intelligent design is mostly a US issue.  Orangemarlin 18:37, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The absence of these worldwide views is significant. Despite being necessary (you can't include information that isn't there), their absence should be explained somewhere in the article.--ZayZayEM 02:05, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suggestions for improving the article 

message: Is protection still needed for this article, or do people think editing could resume calmly? - Jmabel | Talk 01:55, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it should be okay.--ZayZayEM 02:43, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Go ahead and unprotect. --Metzenberg 00:54, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Protection still needed? 

message: Intelligent design, particularly when dealing with Wikipedia's intelligent design article series is clearly dealing with a particular form of the design argument current promugalted (and hijacked) by the Discovery Institute.
Various other theories and philosophies on engineered systems and design belong inside teleological argument and creationism series.
User:Metz did recently try to create an article in the creationism series, but got in to quarrels with another editor (... ... ...) over naming and article direction and other technicalities (messy, messy affair). I do think that perhaps you could work together and coordinate an article on Jewish views in the similar vein to Hinduism and creationism and Islamic creationism that would be better placed in the series than the pseudo-mess Judaism and evolution.
This article however deals with a particular idea: Intelligent design and should stay on topic--ZayZayEM 06:53, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The above clarification helps a lot. If the "Jewish views" noted relate ONLY to a particular form of the geneneric concept of ID then it would held help if the title clearly reflected that. In that case my comments are relevant to Jewish views on the general notion of ID, but not to the Discovery Institute's.Emesz 07:20, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

text: Based on thos section the article should be renamed "Jewish reactions to the Discovery Institute promulgated view on intelligent design". Otherwise the article needs to deal with any view, model, paradigm on ID + E.Emesz 05:55, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Intelligent design]] vs [[intelligent design (disambiguation)]]