“Just a theory” does not mean what many people think it does

Greetings.

Jewish date:  1 Tammuz 5770 (Parashath Ḥuqqath).

Today’s holidays:  Ro’sh Ḥodhesh (Judaism), Eleventh Sunday of Ordinary Time (Roman Catholicism), Feast Day of St. Annie Sprinkle (Church of the SubGenius), Feast Day of Ludovicus Rex Bavariae (Thelema).

Worthy causes of the day:  “Tell Boehner: No BP Bailout”, “Take Action: Support ECEA - Hold Big Oil Accountable!”, “A victory for the Clean Air Act... for now.”, “JCRC-NY State Dept Petition:  Urge State Dept to Investigate Flotilla Passengers”, “Make Alzheimer's a National Priority! - The Petition Site”, and “Take Action: Urge your Senators to support the Appalachia Restoration Act | Rainforest Action Network”.

Topic 0:  I have finished Mort (book 4 of the Discworld Series) by Terry Pratchett.  Now I have to get around to writing a review, which is going to be an interesting challenge since I am going to have a busy week…

Topic 1:  Updates on the latest anti-Semitism:  “Yahoo Divides Jerusalem” discusses Yahoo! trying to enforce an artificial distinction between East Jerusalem and West Jerusalem which only exists as part of a jihad tactic.  “Reuters' Double Exposure” discusses propaganda photograph which has little relation to reality.  And then there are two videos:



Your humble blogger also would like to note “Hamas rejects Israel-approved snack foods for Gaza”, which is absurdly petty; these people are very lucky that Israel does not close the border completely and forbid letting anything whatever getting through.

Topic 2:  “Russia Church wants end to Darwin school monopoly”.  The Russian Orthodox Church wants creationism taught in Russian public schools alongside evolution.  Needless to say, this is a bad idea since evolution is correct and creationism is wrong.  Revealing is this rationalization:

"Darwin's theory remains a theory. This means it should be taught to children as one of several theories, but children should know of other theories too."

“Just a theory” is a common misunderstanding often voiced by creationists.  “Theory” colloquially means what “hypothesis” means an explanation, whether or not it has any real support or is particularly coherent.  To scientists, a “theory” is not a mere hypothesis; a “theory” has evidence to back it up, and it is self-consistent.  E.g., the Theory of General Relativity is not a mere hypothesis; it has been backed with multiple lines of evidence and has technological applications, such as GPS.  Likewise the Theory of Evolution, which is also known to be a fact.

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor: “good solz go to celing cat”:

Peace and happy new month.

Aaron

Beware of ignorance and alleged infallibility

Greetings.

Jewish date:  30 Nisan 5770 (Parashath Thazria‘-Meṣora‘).

Today’s holidays:  Ro’sh Ḥodhesh (Judaism), Wednesday of the Second Week of Easter (Roman Catholicism), St. Adolph Hitler (Church of the SubGenius; I have no clue what they are thinking).

Worthy causes of the day:  “Please Include the Temple Mount in the Heritage Plan - אנא הוסף את הר הבית לרשימת אתרי המורשת Petition”, “Support Universal Subtitles -- Allow Everyone to Watch Online Videos! - The Petition Site”, and “Tell Sen. Kerry: Don't sell out the Clean Air Act”.

Topic 1:  “JewWalking”:  This video is a demonstration of the problem addressed in Religious Literacy by Stephen Prothero (a book I have previously described), that a lot of people in the United States are severely ignorant of religion.  In this instance, someone stood outside a Jewish Community Center and asked Jewish people around basic questions about Judaism—and many got many questions wrong.  This may be humorous, but the humor is a very bitter one.  Being ignorant about a topic makes it difficult or impossible to make correct decisions about it.  In religion, this may include matters of salvation, damnation, afterlife, and reincarnation—no small matters. Even if one comes to the conclusion that no religion can be correct, being ignorant of religion makes for severe trouble in understanding and dealing with religiously knowledgeable and active people, which includes a very sizable fraction of the planet.

Note:  Those wishing to know more about Judaism can always talk to me or ask their local Orthodox rabbi.  Clergy of all religions should be open to sharing what they know.

Topic 2:  “A Fallible Pope, an Imperfect Church”:  Rav Shmuely Boteach reflects on the recent scandals from the Roman Catholic Church and argues that the Church has to come to terms with its imperfection and not try to pretend otherwise.  Major rule:  Reality is what it is, regardless of how we want it to be.  Therefore ignoring one’s faults is a sure way to screw up.

Topic 3:  “That’s Random!  A Look at Viral Self-Assembly”.  This article deals with the often-misunderstood notion of randomness and discusses how it is harnessed biologically, specifically in the assembly of viruses from their basic components.  Videos are included showing this actually works.

Topic 4:  For today’s religious humor:  “Mecca Cat”:


Peace.

Aaron

Amnesia and morality

Greetings.

Jewish date:  29 Nisan 5770 (Parashath Thazira‘-Meṣora‘).

Today’s holidays:  Day 14 of the ‘Omer (Judaism), Feast Day of Martin I (Roman Catholicism), Feast Day of St. Bill Hicks (The Great) (Church of the SubGenius).

Worthy causes of the day:  “Heart Disease and Stroke. You’re the Cure.”, “MoveOn.org Political Action: Obama's Supreme Court Pick”, “Equal Pay for Equal Work! - The Petition Site”, and “Take Action: TrueMajority.org:  Bring back the WPA!”

Topic 1:  “Happy or sad, emotions persisted beyond remembering an event in people with amnesia”:  This article correctly notes that making people with poor memory still retain emotions even after forgetting why they are feeling they way they do.  As such, treating them with kindness is not a waste, even in cynical moral systems; one can brighten their day even if they do not remember their day being brightened.

Topic 2:  “Evangelical scholar expelled over evolution”.  The scholar in question, Bruce Waltke, was forced to resign from his post as Professor of Old Testament at Reformed Theological Seminary because of his public acceptance of belief in evolution.  Now, I wholeheartedly support the right of religious groups to choose who is in good standing with them and who is not.  Reformed Theological Seminary is trying to fight something which is objectively true, that evolution is real.  Physical reality pays no attention to what any of us believe is true, and firing Waltke is not going to change the truth of evolution one bit.  They have therefore decidedly placed themselves on what is inevitably the losing side of the argument.

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor:  “Lord, Fanx foar the fud I am about tu lick…”:


Peace.

Aaron

Translation anomalies and the origin of ethics

Greetings.

Jewish date:  6 Nisan 5770 (Parashath Ṣaw).

Today’s holidays:  Fifth Sunday of Lent (Roman Catholicism), Spring Equinox (Thelema), Naw-Rúz (Bahá’í Faith).

Worthy cause of the day:  “Stop the Money Train to Washington - The Petition Site”.

Topic 1:  Yet another translation problem:  The King James Version translates the Hebrew minḥah (used  first  in Leviticus 2:4 and periodically afterwards) as “meat offering”.  While this may have been an accurate translation in the days of King James I, the meaning of “meat” has changed substantially since then.  The actual meaning of minḥah, which makes sense in context, is “flour offering”.

I also came across a translation anomaly in the New Testament recently, too.  In the story of the prodigal son, Luke 15:16 specifically, pigs are described in the original Greek as eating keratiōn.  The King James Version translates this as “husks”, while the New International Version says “pods”.  But the dictionary claimed something rather more specific:  “St. John’s bread”, also known as “carobs” and Ceratonia siliqua.  I have no idea why this discrepancy exists.

Topic 2:  “The Ethical Dog”.  There is a major question about where morality and ethics come from.  My view is that they are social constructs which may (or may not) be imposed by a god.  This article notes that the constructs have evolutionary roots:  ethics evolved because they aid the survival of those who play by the rules and thus getting genes on to the next generation.

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor:  “My temple is prepared.”

I am under the impression that at least some cats really seem to think this way.

Peace.

Aaron

Defending the indefensible

Greetings.

Jewish date:  23 ’Adhar 5770 (Parashath Wayyaqhel-Fequdhe).

Today’s holiday:  Feast of Frances of Rome (Roman Catholicism).

Worthy cause of the day:  “Alliance for Justice:  Call for Investigation of Missing Torture Emails”, “MoveOn.org Political Action: Tell the party establishment to stay out”, and “CARE:  Voices Against Violence”.

Topic 1:  “When Court Jews Defend Moral Cowards”.  This article by Rav Shmuley Boteach has much less to do with court Jews than moral cowards who defend the indefensible.  Particularly taking a beating is Pope Pius XII, who is infamous for his failure to do much of anything against the Nazis and all their moral atrocities during World War II.  Religion is supposed to be about what is true, not what would be politically expedient to believe or what we want to believe.  Do note that all glossing over the Armenian genocide and Pius XII’s indifference is actually doing is making people angry.

Topic 2:  More anti-Semitism:  “What New Settlement?” and “Jerusalem on the Media Frontline”.  Both of these articles deal with dishonesty in reporting, the first with the untenable claim that adding 112 housing units to a preexisting city in Israel constitutes a “new settlement” and the second attacking the assumption that anything the government of Israel does regarding Arabs living in Jerusalem is necessarily not for their benefit.  Meanwhile, Muslims have been rioting on the Temple Mount, including throwing stones at Jews worshipping at the Western Wall, and blaming Jews and Israel for their temper tantrum and Israeli police trying to restore the peace.  This indecent, rationalizing sort of behavior is precedented; after all, Yasser ‘Arafat launched second intifada and made the excuse that ’Ari’el Sharon was somehow to blame for simply taking a stroll around the Temple Mount.

Topic 3:  Other articles which I wish to note but do not have time to discuss:  “Al-Qaida calls on US Muslims to attack America”, “Scientology in the spotlight amid fresh allegations”, and “Top home-school texts dismiss Darwin, evolution”.

Topic 4:  For today’s religious humor, courtesy of Barry and Nancy: “The economy is hitting us all pretty hard”:

Probably this was totally unintentional.

Peace.

Aaron

Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work. Proof by assertion does not work.

Greetings.

Jewish date:  19 ’Adhar 5770 (Parashath Ki Thissa’).

Today’s holidays:  Friday of the Second Week of Lent (Roman Catholicism), Feast Day of the Magi: Lao-Tzu (Thelema), World Day of Prayer (Christianity).

Worthy cause of the day:  “Take Action: Join Us for the Food Safety Action Day on the Hill!”.

Topic 1:  Pesaḥ (Passover) is coming in less than a month.  You can find out a lot about it at the site of the Orthodox Union, which includes their annual Passover Guide.

Topic 2:  “Darwin Foes Add Warming to Targets” and “Redefining The Creation/Evolution Controversy”.  Both of these articles deal with creationists.  The first deals with creationists also supporting denial of global warming and trying to use legal maneuvers to coerce have both unlikely beliefs taught in public schools.  Major rule:  Truth is not determined by governments.  For example,
Trofim Lysenko convinced Joseph Stalin that Medelian genetics was wrong and hypotheses that acquired characteristics could be inherited.  Lysenkoism therefore became what the USSR deemed truth, and since Lysenkoism is wrong, Soviet genetics was put back by decades.  The second article attacks the notion that the evolution-creationism controversy is an argument between science and religion.  This idea is often assumed to be true because it is said so often (proof by assertion).  The author of this article is the man behind The Clergy Letter Project, a series of letters signed by thousands of clergy affirming the truth of evolution and exposing the proof by assertion as baseless.

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor:  “Buddha Cat”:


Peace and Shabbath shalom.

Aaron

Robot evolution and the Goldstone Report

Greetings.

Jewish date:  19 Shevaṭ 5770 (Parashath Yithro).

Today’s holidays:  Feasts of Blase and Ansgar (Roman Catholicism).

Topic 1:  “Robots Display Predator-Prey Co-Evolution, Evolve Better Homing Techniques”:  A common technique of creationist apologetics is to claim that something could not have possibly have evolved.  (One would have thought the rise of multi-drug resistance would have killed the illusion that evolution is merely hypothetical.)  This article discusses evolution of robot behavior, specifically co-evolution of robot behaviors when robot behaviors are selected for different goals.

Topic 2:  “Goldstone Poison”.  This Dry Bones cartoon deals with the Goldstone Report in terms of an anti-Semitic blood libel.  The text commentary backs this up with an article by Alan Dershowitz which exposes the Report’s twisted morality.

Topic 3:  For today’s religious humor:  “der iz a speshul ring of hell”:

Clearly Dante was an influence on this cat and the Easter Bunny on his/her owner.

Peace.

Aaron

10 Ṭeveth and selective breeding

Greetings.

Jewish date:  10 Ṭeveth 5770 (Parashath Wayḥi).

Today’s holidays:  The Fast of Ṭeveth (Judaism), Feast of the Holy Family (Roman Catholicism), Ashurah (Islam).

Worthy cause of the day:  “Don't Let Consumer Electronics Fuel the Congo Conflict - The Petition Site”.

Topic 1:  “The Fast of the Tenth of Tevet on OU.ORG”, which gives some basic information on today’s Jewish holiday.  10 Ṭeveth is part of a set of holidays commemorating the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem, as well as other sad events.  Noted especially is that the point of fasting is as a means towards repentance; fasting coupled with irrelevant or contradictory activities misses the point.

Topic 2:  “Nice Rats, Nasty Rats: Maybe It’s All in the Genes”.  This article describes experiments in Siberia on domestication started in 1959 by Dmitri K. Belyaev.  Belyaev worked with silver foxes.  In less that 40 years the foxes had been bred into tame, very doglike animals.  This rapid rate of change through selective breeding has also been replicated in rats.  That selective pressure can operate so quickly to produce such dramatic results should be a warning to those who deny the power of evolution.  One of the claims frequently made by creationists is that huge changes are impossible.  But humans have tampered with every animal and plant we have domesticated, sometimes dramatically.  Dogs are domesticated wolves, but one would not recognize many dog breeds as such at first glance; indeed, many dog breeds are so different from each other, e.g, chihuahua and Saint Bernard, that they could easily be mistaken for separate species.  If humans have such power over other creatures through use of selective breeding, imagine what a god could do.

Peace, and have an easy fast.

Aaron

The relationship between religion and science, religious oppression, and torturing cats

Greetings.

Jewish date:  4 Ṭeveth 5770 (Parashath Wayyiggash).

Today’s holidays:  Saint Day of Peter Canisius (Roman Catholicism), Winter Solstice/Yule (various).

Worthy cause of the day:  “Put Wall Street to Work Rebuilding Main Street! - The Petition Site”.

Topic 1:  “Creation, Evolution, and Christian Laypeople”.  This article deals with perceived conflicts between Christianity and science.  Notable is the debunking of the notion that if humans are hardwired for religion, this would prove all religions are wrong; for all we know, a creator deity could have bred this into humanity deliberately.  Much of this article deals with the question of how to interpret the early chapters of Genesis, Romans 5, and 1 Corinthians 15.  The early parts of Genesis are hard enough for Jews to interpret.  For Christians it is worse since the New Testament, which has the notion of Original Sin, seems to take the position that ’Adham and Ḥawwah (Adam and Eve) were historical figures.  The attempt is interesting, even if one does not agree.

Topic 2:  More religious oppression:  “Plot Targeting Turkey’s Religious Minorities Allegedly Discovered” (and the plot does not even make sense), “Turks Threaten to Kill Priest over Swiss Minaret Decision” (misplaced and inappropriate rage), “Minister says burqa-style veils impede citizenship” (focus on symbols rather than substance), and “KYRGYZSTAN: Religious freedom survey, December 2009”.

Topic 3:  For some more or less religious humor:  “Dress ur cat in gay apparel”.


Peace, and please, do not torture your cat.

Aaron

Nonsectarian prayer is a fantasy; we do not all worship the same god

Greetings.

Jewish date:  5 Kislew 5770 (Parasheth Wayyeṣe’).

Today’s holidays:  Saint Day of Christ the King (Roman Catholicism).

Worthy cause of the day:  “Take Action: Ask for renewable energy that keeps wildlands and wildlife safe”.

Topic 1:  “Birth of New Species Witnessed by Scientists”.  Creationists, pay attention:  evolution happens in real time, even within a human lifetime.

Topic 2:  “Jesus vs. Allah”.  This article discusses and rightly criticizes the notion of “nonsectarian prayer”.  “Nonsectarian prayer” is an attempt to get around the constitutional prohibition of the government favoring any particular religion in order to have a government-sponsored prayer at a governmental function.  The problem is that there is no single god worshipped by everyone.  No one is going to accept a prayer addressed “to Whom it may concern”, and no name for any deity is going to be acceptable to everyone.  Every name carries with it connotations.  For example, “Allah”, suggested by David Hamilton, screams “Islam” to practically everyone in the West, no matter how much anyone tries to rationalize that it does not.  Even “God” is not a good choice; while commonly used generically, different religions have radically different ideas who “God” is.  It is very easy to misinterpret “God” to refer to one’s own god rather than the god the speaker intended.  People try to bend the notion of “God” to fit their own notions.  For an example, see my recent commentary on His Dark Materials, in which “God” refers to a being bearing only vague surface resemblance to the God of Christianity.  This is why Muslims in Malaysia are going crazy over Christians using “Allah” to refer to the God of Christanity; they cannot accept that “Allah” might refer to anyone other than the God of Islam.  It is also why I have made a concerted effort to not used “God” to refer to the God of Judaism, but rather have taken to using “YHWH” and “HashShem” instead; the latter terms are unambiguous and take a lot more effort to bend to mean anything different.

Topic 3:  More religious humor:  “Prudence”.

All of you who are puzzled:  think The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis.  (I have to get around to rereading The Chronicles of Narnia sometime...)  And I do hope to make religious humor a regular feature on this blog, besides serious topics.  I do not want to be completely dour, complaining about bad religion all the time, and sometimes the humor itself can be revealing.

Aaron

Esotericism in Genesis

Greetings.

Jewish date:  28 Tishri 5770 (Parashath Bere’shith).

Today’s holidays:  Choti Diwali – Narak Chaturdashi (day 2 of Diwali; Hinduism), Feast of Ida Craddock (Thelema).

Worthy cause of the day:  “MoveOn.org Political Action: Harry Reid: Include the Public Option” and “Take Action: Wild Lands Need You! Help Pass A Strong Climate Bill”.

Today’s topic:  This week’s parashah (section of the Torah read by Jews in synagogue), Bere’shith (Genesis 1:1-6:8), deals with the contentious subject of the origins of the Universe and humanity.  I have decided to take this opportunity to publish some material on this subject which has until now been sitting around on my hard drive doing nothing.

Contrary to the impression left by the people who make the most noise, belief in evolution is perfectly orthodox in Judaism and is approved by the Rabbinical Council of America (Creation, Evolution, and Intelligent Design 2005).

My personal take on the question:  There is no doubt that the opening chapters of Genesis have often been interpreted close to their literal meaning; this should be obvious to anyone who opens up Miqra’oth Gedoloth, the popular collection of commentaries on the Hebrew Bible.  However, there is reason to believe this is not the only legitimate way to interpret this material.  It is attested that in the times of Tanna’im and the ’Amora’im (≈ 40 BCE-450 CE), there were two branches of Pharisaic Jewish esoteric knowledge, Ma‘aseh Bere’shith (“the work of creation”) and Ma‘aseh Merkavah (“the work of the Chariot”) (Scholem 1987) which were only to be taught to a select few (Talmudh Bavli, Ḥaghighah 11b-12a; Talmudh Bavli Ḥaghighah 13a; Talmudh Bavli, Meghillah 25a-25b; Mishneh Torah, Sefer hamMadda‘, Hilkhoth Yesodhe hatTorah 4:17-18).  Due to insufficient transmission, this knowledge has been lost (Maimonides and Friedländer 1903, introduction to section 3).  Since we know we have this loss, it is irrational to assume that any specific interpretation of the pre-Abrahamic material in Genesis (Genesis 1:1-11:9) is the One True Interpretation (as if in Judaism we normally spoke in terms of One True Interpretations).  Furthermore, the fact that Ma‘aseh Bere’shith was considered inappropriate for all but a select few suggests something far removed from the literal meaning of the text, something difficult to understand and liable to misinterpretation.

For comparison, note the Song of Songs, which is traditionally regarded as esoteric and never to be taken a literal love song.

Physics is an aspect of the Divine Will.  Evolution, which is an effect of physics, is thus a working of the Divine Will.  Who are we to insist to YHWH how the Universe and everything in it was created?  Note that nothing in the Hebrew Bible conditions Divine love or mercy (or hatred or anger) or the commandments on our ancestry.  This is despite humanity’s humble origins even according to the literal meaning of the text:  dirt (Genesis 2:7).  Spiritual giants have often had humble beginnings.  It is not our origin which makes us important; it is who we are now and what we may become.

Bibliography:

Creation, Evolution, and Intelligent Design. Rabbinical Council of America, 2005-12-27 2005 [cited 2009-02-09. Available from http://www.rabbis.org/news/article.cfm?id=100635.

Maimonides, Moses, and Michael Friedländer. The guide for the perplexed (2d). G. Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. 1903 [cited. Available from http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/gfp/index.htm.

Scholem, Gershom. 1987. Kabbalah. New York: Dorset Press. Original edition, Jerusalem:  Keter Publishing House Ltd., 1974.

Aaron