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Orthodox Judaism and Evolution

please explain.
What has been denied by who and why?
 
joobz said:
please explain.
What has been denied by who and why?
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In the survey described, 156 of 180 Orthodox Jews surveyed disagreed with the statement "Evolution correctly explains the origin of life." 163 disagreed with the statement "Human beings evolved from apes."

As to why, the article says "These two results alone are dramatic and unsettling, but as will be seen below, they do not represent the end of the rejection of mainstream science on the part of the respondents."

They regard it as a rejection of mainstream science.

My point is that there have been a number of evolutionists on this forum who would rejeject these statements, without rejecting 'mainstream science'. I think this is a poor quality survey, if it doesn't go into why the statements are rejected.
 
joobz said:
please explain.
What has been denied by who and why?
Click to expand...

The statement "evolution correctly explains the origin of life" is scientifically incorrect because it confuses the idea of evolution (the change in living species over time) with abiogenesis (the origins of life from non-living matter).

The statement "human beings evolved from apes" is false if "apes" is interpreted to mean "modern apes." Human beings are not evolved from chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, etc.; but they share common ancestors with them, common ancestors that would be considered to be "apes" by taxonomists.

On the other hand, since the respondants also overwhelmingly rejected statements like "the earth is millions of years old," and "dinosaurs lived millons of years before humans," I doubt that scientific accuracy was the main reason that the subjects objected to humans descending from apes.
 
I would agree with the first statement with the caveate that science is still tweaking the Theory of Evolution so certain aspects may change, but the basic premise that Evolution correctly explains the origin of life poses no trouble for me.

I do agree with you on the second point. The proper phrasing should be "Human beings and apes evolved from a common ancestor". That bugged me too when I read the article.

EDIT: After reading drkitten's response, I would like to amend my response. I, myself, confused evolution with abiogenesis. My bad...as my son would say.
 
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It is a poorly worded survey. I would have answered "False" to the first two questions. Furthermore it is not a properly randomized sample, so no inferences about any populations can be drawn from it.

A proper survey requires, among other things, careful pretesting of the questions, a defined procedure for obtaining a random sample, and demographic questions for verifying the sample.
 
Agree with everything above.

It doesn't seem like a well-randomized survey. There is also some confusion over "Orthodox" as a classification. I think that Orthodox and Modern Orthodox Jews would score better. The only Jews I know who are dogmatically anti-evolution are Ultra-Orthodox and Hassidim. I cannot tell what portion of the survey respondents were Hassidic and what portion would describe themselves as Modern Orthodox.

The first two questions are also poorly worded. As has been said, they are consistent with the answer to better worded questions about the age of the earth, so the problem may not be in the ambiguity of the statements.
 
I'm not an evolutionist any more than I'm a gravitationalist but I would have disagreed with both of those statements simply because they are incorrect.

Some of the other answers are disturbing though.
 
now I understand the issue. I'll admit, I read the statements with an uncritical eye and considered true on both.

However, in my defense i was considering the ancestral ape.
I have no excuse for confusing abiogenesis and evolution, except that I feel that there was type of evolution involved in abiogenesis.
I guess the hard part is when do we call it "life"
 
Maybe I'm missing something, but I just don't get the point of this article. Where's the bit that marks it out from well, duh? It smacks of a cheap-shot when they're short of editorial; let's get down with the kaftan-and-ringlet brigade and rustle up some copy. Easy as hell, doesn't even need any thought, start with a question that drkitten squelched with a glance. Featured Article?

I'll stick with Randi's Commentary. If he has nothing to say he doesn't say it.
 
Skeptic Guy said:
The proper phrasing should be "Human beings and apes evolved from a common ancestor".
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Shouldn't that be "Human beings and other apes evolved from a common ancestor"?

Is there a non-(woo/feelgood/pompous) reason why humans are singled out as non-apes that would not apply equally well to chimps?

Moquito - Orangutans and apes evolved from a common ancestor
 
Is there a non-(woo/feelgood/pompous) reason why humans are singled out as non-apes that would not apply equally well to chimps?
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No there isn't, this is one of my big pet peeves right next to the confusion of apes with monkeys. Humans are still apes, there's no biological reason to make a distinction, especially if you consider the word ape to be synonymous with hominoidea (great ape is hominidae).

I had the same initial reactions to the questions as most people, that they were so badly worded that people who understand evolution would have to say no. Thus, it cant be trusted as an accurate measure of the opinions of a population. Even so, i do doubt that the rates of acceptance (it's NOT a belief) of evolution among orthodox jews is much different from that reported.
 
CACTUSJACKmankin said:
No there isn't, this is one of my big pet peeves right next to the confusion of apes with monkeys. Humans are still apes, there's no biological reason to make a distinction, especially if you consider the word ape to be synonymous with hominoidea (great ape is hominidae).
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... and of course, if you consider "ape" to be synonymous with hominoidea-except-for-Homo-sapiens, then humans are not "apes."

There's no good biological reason for distinguishing panthers from leopards (both Panthera pardus, if I remember right), any more than there's a biological reason for distinguishing redheads from blondes. And yet we do.

Peepul is dumm.
 
drkitten said:
There's no good biological reason for distinguishing panthers from leopards (both Panthera pardus, if I remember right), any more than there's a biological reason for distinguishing redheads from blondes. And yet we do.

Peepul is dumm.
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Shouldn't that be "Blondes is dumm"? :boxedin:
 
sphenisc said:
In the survey described, 156 of 180 Orthodox Jews surveyed disagreed with the statement "Evolution correctly explains the origin of life." 163 disagreed with the statement "Human beings evolved from apes."

As to why, the article says "These two results alone are dramatic and unsettling, but as will be seen below, they do not represent the end of the rejection of mainstream science on the part of the respondents."

They regard it as a rejection of mainstream science.

My point is that there have been a number of evolutionists on this forum who would rejeject these statements, without rejecting 'mainstream science'. I think this is a poor quality survey, if it doesn't go into why the statements are rejected.
Click to expand...

There are reasons for that as they are poorly worded. Evolution never tried to explain the orrigion of life, that is not what it is about. If someone believes it does then they don't know the theory. It is rather like saying gravity does not explain an electro magnet, of course it doesn't that is not what the theory is about.

As for evolving from apes, it is not really right to say any two contemperary organisms evolved from one to the other. Mamals might have evolved out of reptile like beings but not out or modern reptiles. So if you are a stickler for percision(generaly a good thing in science) those statements are false strictly speaking
 
CACTUSJACKmankin said:
No there isn't, this is one of my big pet peeves right next to the confusion of apes with monkeys. Humans are still apes, there's no biological reason to make a distinction, especially if you consider the word ape to be synonymous with hominoidea (great ape is hominidae).
Click to expand...


Of course, if "ape" is synoymous with "Hominoidea", then "dinosaur" should be synonymous with "Dinosauria"; and cladistically this should include Aves(birds). So dinosaurs lived at the same time as humans. Yet another hole in the surveys results!

[Arthur Askey voice] I thank you! [/Arthur Askey voice]

:)
 
sphenisc said:
Of course, if "ape" is synoymous with "Hominoidea", then "dinosaur" should be synonymous with "Dinosauria"; and cladistically this should include Aves(birds). So dinosaurs lived at the same time as humans. Yet another hole in the surveys results!

[Arthur Askey voice] I thank you! [/Arthur Askey voice]

:)
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:confused: Dinosaurs did not live at the same time as humans? And here I am eating dino-salad (chicken). Better check the "Best before"-date on that one.

Mosquito - Dino contemporary :cool:
 
If I were a woo I would probably have to make a big deal on how Pandora.com decided to play Dirk Dale's version of "Hava Nagila" while I was reading the article. :D
 
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