Avodah Mailing List

Volume 25: Number 344

Fri, 26 Sep 2008

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Subjects Discussed In This Issue:
Message: 1
From: "M Cohen" <mco...@touchlogic.com>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2008 13:01:21 -0400
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] induction cooking


RZS writes ..Why is this (covering the knobs) bedieved?  Covering the knobs
is parallel to gerifah; the top part of the blech that covers the flame is
parallel to ketima.  Standard
blechs do both, but only one is necessary.


this question arises all the time (espec wrt to crockpots)

see IMoshe (I don't have the ref right now) that the flame is the place to
cover.

although I have heard some claim that covering the knobs is good enough, 
I have not found a teshuvah in print that says it.

although some say that R Aharon Kotler held that covering the knobs is good
enough, 
R Shlomo miller (RAK talmid, R kollel Toronto) told me that this is
completely false.

mordechai cohen





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Message: 2
From: Zev Sero <z...@sero.name>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2008 13:11:50 -0400
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] induction cooking


M Cohen wrote:
> RZS writes
>> ..Why is this (covering the knobs) bedieved?  Covering the knobs
>> is parallel to gerifah; the top part of the blech that covers the flame is
>> parallel to ketima.  Standard
>> blechs do both, but only one is necessary.

> this question arises all the time (espec wrt to crockpots)
> 
> see IMoshe (I don't have the ref right now) that the flame is the place
> to cover.

But gerifa is *not* about covering anything.  It's about making it
impossible to adjust the flame.


> although I have heard some claim that covering the knobs is good enough, 
> I have not found a teshuvah in print that says it.

Why would you need a teshuvah?  Please explain how it's different from
gerifah.


> although some say that R Aharon Kotler held that covering the knobs
> is good enough,  R Shlomo miller (RAK talmid, R kollel Toronto) told me
> that this is completely false.

Since I'm not relying on these "some say", telling me that they were
wrong doesn't change anything.  Why do we need an authority when we
have a clear halacha that gerifah is enough, unless we can first come
up with a meaningful distinction between them?

-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
z...@sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                                                  - Clarence Thomas



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Message: 3
From: Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2008 17:42:58 -0400
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] Free Will vs. Physics


On Wed, September 24, 2008 4:33 pm, Yitzhak Grossman wrote:
: On Tue, 23 Sep 2008 22:20:10 EDT T6...@aol.com wrote:
:> I believe that most of the decisions we make are  actually forced
:> decisions and not the product of free will. Hakol b'yedei Shomayim chutz
:> miyiras Shomayim.

: Rambam (Shemonah Perakim 8) explains that statement to mean that *all*
: human actions are within the scope of man's will, and what Hazal meant
: by hakol bidei shamayim are those things that are not within man's
: control, such as his physical stature and the climate.

C.f.: Hakol biydei Shamayim chutz mitzinim upachim

Tosafos there (Kesuvos 30a) say that "hakol" has different meanings in
each. One is discussing human nature, which all flows from what G-d gave
us and subjects us to, as shaped by our decisions WRT yir'as Shamayim. The
other is discussing what happens to a person, and again saying that
while Hashem sets everything up, we can avert consequences by our choices.

It is very much (somewhat made more obvious in the way I worded my summary
of the Tosafos' position, so you should open Kesuvos and look for yourself
-- it's too long not to summarize) like my earlier post about mice in
mazes, who can only make choices where they exist and only the among
the options they are handed.

RET is right that too much of the topic is over our heads. But when has
that ever stopped us before?

The first problem is just defining Free Will. What is something that is
neither deterministic, reducing people to robots, and not random like
a set of dice? We're claiming some middle ground. RMKoppel proves that
there are things that are neither describable in algorithms nor random,
but what kind of such "middle ground" do we mean in this case? Can we
narrow it down enough to know what it is we're trying to prove?

RET also mentions "various experiments that ask questions about free
will." The only ones I know of are by Benjamin Libet. I first saw
the discussion in a blog called Conscious Entities (on the nature of
intelligence, is AI possible, etc...), but Wikipedia's description
is shorter:

> Researchers carrying out Libet's procedure would ask each participant to
> sit at a desk in front of the oscilloscope timer. They would affix the
> EEG electrodes to the participant's scalp, and would then instruct the
> subject to carry out some small, simple motor activity, such as pressing
> a button, or flexing a finger or wrist, within a certain time frame. No
> limits were placed on the number of times the subject could perform the
> action within this period.

> During the experiment, the subject would be asked to note the position
> of the dot on the oscilloscope timer when "he/she was first aware of the
> wish or urge to act" (control tests with Libet's equipment demonstrated
> a comfortable margin of error of only -- 50 milliseconds). Pressing
> the button also recorded the position of the dot on the oscillator,
> this time electronically. By comparing the marked time of the button's
> pushing and the subject's conscious decision to act, researchers were
> able to calculate the total time of the trial from the subject's initial
> volition through to the resultant action. On average, approximately two
> hundred milliseconds elapsed between the first appearance of conscious
> will to press the button and the act of pressing it. As of 2008, the
> upcoming outcome of a decision could be found in study of the brain
> activity in the prefrontal and parietal cortex up to 10 seconds before
> the subject was aware of their decision.[4]

> Researchers also analyzed EEG recordings for each trial with respect to
> the timing of the action. It was noted that brain activity involved in
> the initiation of the action, primarily centered in the secondary motor
> cortex, occurred, on average, approximately five hundred milliseconds
> before the trial ended with the pushing of the button. That is to say,
> researchers recorded mounting brain activity related to the resultant
> action as many as three hundred milliseconds before subjects reported
> the first awareness of conscious will to act. In other words, apparently
> conscious decisions to act were preceded by an unconscious buildup of
> electrical charge within the brain -- this buildup came to be called
> Bereitschaftspotential or readiness potential.

> Libet's experiments suggest unconscious processes in the brain are the
> true initiator of volitional acts, therefore, little room remains for
> the operations of free will. If the brain has already taken steps to
> initiate an action before we are aware of any desire to perform it,
> the causal role of consciousness in volition is all but eliminated.

> Libet finds room for free will in the interpretation of his results only
> in the form of 'the power of veto'...

IOW, that there is no free will, only free won't.

The blog <http://www.consciousentities.com/libet.htm> I saw this on
suggested other explanations:
> There are several avenues of attack against Libet's other conclusions,
> of course. Is the RP really a signal that a decision has been made? If I
> make a decision about my insurance policy, does an RP appear, or is it
> just wrist movements that cause RPs? The circumstances of both Libet's
> experiments and the earlier ones by Kornhuber and Deecke are rather
> strange: they require the subject to get into a frame of mind where they
> are ready to make a decision any moment. Might not the RP merely signal
> a quickening of attention, rather than a moment of decision?

> Libet believes that by timing the moment of awareness through his
> oscilloscope arrangement, he eliminated the need for the subject to spend
> any time on reporting the moment of awareness: but isn't it possible that
> we need a certain amount of time just in order to report the awareness
> to ourselves? Awareness of the decision you have made is one thing,
> being aware of that awareness is another - which might well be thought
> to require some further time to develop.

> Personally I also doubt whether it is necessary to reduce free will to a
> veto system - 'free won't' as it has been described. Libet often seems
> to take it for granted that every free act is preceded by a specific
> act of will: but that isn't really the case. Often the conscious mind
> sets a general plan, on which we then act more or less automatically. A
> tennis player has thought in general terms about how to play the next
> stroke long before the need for actual action: drivers have a kind of
> running rule in the back of their mind to the effect that if something
> suddenly appears in front of them, they hit the brake. Free will operates
> at this higher level, with all our actions being managed in detail by
> unconscious processes. I don't have to think about where I want to hit
> the ball at the very moment of decision in order to control my game
> of tennis any more than I have to think separately about each of the
> individual muscles I am implicitly proposing to contract.

So, then in April 17th (since I last checked Conscious Entities blog) he
reported "new research (published in a 'Brief Communication' in Nature
Neuroscience by Chun Siong Soon, Marcel Brass, Hans-Jochen Heinze and
John-Dylan Haynes) goes beyond it. Whereas the delay between decision
and awareness detected by Libet lasted 500 milliseconds, the new
research seems to show that decisions can be predicted up to ten seconds
before the deciders are aware of having made up their minds."

Returning to the blog <http://www.consciousentities.com/?p=64>:
> The experimenters also ran a series of experiments where the subject
> chose left or right at a pre-determined time: this does not seem to
> have shortened the delays, but it showed up a difference between the
> activation in the frontopolar cortex and the precuneus: briefly, it
> looks as if the former peaks at the earliest stage, with the precuneus
> 'storing' the decision through more continuous activation.

> What is the significance of these new findings? The researchers suggest
> the results do three things: they show that the delay is not confined
> to areas which are closely associated with motor activity, but begins
> in 'higher' areas; they demonstrate clearly that the activity relates
> to identifiable decisions, not just general preparation; and they rule
> out one of the main lines of attack on Libet's findings, namely that the
> small delay observed is a result of mistiming, error, or misunderstanding
> of the chronology. That seems correct -- a variety of arguments of
> differing degrees of subtlety have been launched against the timings
> of Libet's original work. Although Libet himself was scrupulous about
> demonstrating solid reasons for his conclusions, it always seemed that a
> delay of a few hundred milliseconds might perhaps be attributable to some
> sort of error in the book-keeping, especially since timing a decision
> is obviously a tricky business. A delay of ten seconds is altogether
> harder to explain away.

> However, it seems to me that while the new results close off one line
> of attack, they reinforce another -- the claim that these experiments
> do not represent normal decision making. We do not typically make random
> decisions at a random moment of our choosing, and it can therefore fairly
> be argued that the research has narrower implications than might appear,
> or even that they are merely a strange by-product of the peculiar mental
> processes the subjects were asked to undertake. While the delay was
> restricted to half a second, it was intuitively believable that all
> our normal decisions were subject to a similar time-lag -- surprising,
> but believable. A delay of ten seconds in normal conscious thought is
> not credible at all; it's easy to think of cases where an unexpected
> contingency arises and we act on it thoughtfully and consciously within
> much shorter periods than that.

> The researchers might well bite the bullet so far as that goes,
> accepting that their results show only that the delay can be as long
> as ten seconds, not that it invariably is. Libet himself, had he lived
> to see these results might perhaps have been tempted to elaborate his
> idea of 'free won't' -- that while decisions build up in our brains for
> a period before we are aware of them, the conscious mind retains a kind
> of veto at the last moment.

> What would be best of all, of course, is further research into decisions
> made in more real-life circumstances, though devising a way in which
> decisions can be identified and timed accurately in such circumstances
> is something of a challenge.

> In the meantime, is this another blow to the idea of free will
> generally? The research will certainly hearten hard determinists,
> but personally I remain a compatibilist. I think making a decision and
> becoming aware of having made that decision are two different things,
> and I have no deep problem with the idea that they may occur at different
> times. The delay between decision and awareness does not mean the decision
> wasn't ours, any more than the short delay before we hear our own voice
> means we didn't intend what we said. Others, I know, will feel that this
> relegates consciousness to the status of an epiphenomenon.

SheTir'u baTov!
-micha

-- 
Micha Berger		 "Man wants to achieve greatness overnight,
mi...@aishdas.org	 and he wants to sleep well that night too." http://www.aishdas.org     - Rav Yosef
Yozel Horwitz, Alter of
Novarodok
Fax: (270) 514-1507





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Message: 4
From: "Rich, Joel" <JR...@sibson.com>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2008 19:07:05 -0400
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] Free Will Vs. Physics




 

        If you meant to do a mitzva and through no fault of your own you
were 
        

        unable to complete the action, you still get schar
        


But not as if you had actually done it.  


That's true. If you had done it, you'd be in the first row.  If you were
unable to complete the action, you'd be in the second or third row.


I recall as a teenager being told I got "s'char licha" for going to shul
when it turned out there was no minyan (during a blizzard).


ri 
==================================
I'm not sure this is a settled question-I have heard it both ways.
 
KT
Joel Rich 
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Message: 5
From: Yitzhak Grossman <cele...@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2008 19:18:59 -0400
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] Outside societies' standards


On Wed, 24 Sep 2008 15:11:51 -0400
"Rich, Joel" <JR...@sibson.com> wrote:

...

> Several questions - other than R'OY in his pants tshuva does anyone know
> of sources in non- monetary cases which specifically mention outer
> society as measure?  was the prisha saying either/or?  If it's not from
> the outside, how did malbush yisrtael get defined over the years?

Rav Breish (Shut Helkas Ya'akov EH 14:1) argues against artificial
insemination with donor sperm from the fact that the Catholics and the
Pope find it morally abhorrent.  He cites several precedents for the
concept of banning that which non-Jews consider immoral, including the
Magen Avraham (244:8) prohibiting a form of Amirah L'Akum which is
permitted midina, since the non-Jews do not allow even non-non-Jews to
work on their holidays, and if we would allow it (mutatis mutandis), a
Hilul Hashem would ensue.  Rav Moshe Feinstein (published there #17)
rejects this principle entirely, insisting that we do not care about
what the non-Jews prohibit for religious reasons, since their beliefs
are merely nonsense and Avodah Zarah, and on the contrary, it is
prohibited to adopt their religious doctrines.  He refutes Rav Breish's
proofs, and the latter counters his rebuttal in glosses to the
responsum.

> Joel Rich

Yitzhak
--
Bein Din Ledin - bdl.freehostia.com
An advanced discussion of Hoshen Mishpat




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Message: 6
From: Cantor Wolberg <cantorwolb...@cox.net>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2008 20:57:34 -0400
Subject:
[Avodah] Conflicting Sources


"Tefillin, for example, was left a machloqes for millenia. Yigal Yadin
found evidence of the machloqes back in the days of a Sanhedrin, and it
lasted into the 12th century (Rabbeinu Tam was born in 1100 CE).

Tzitzis in the days of the Sanhedrin were tied in a wide variety of  
ways.
The geonim, rishonim and achronim come to many different recommendations
given the conflicting sources."

I thought the purpose of the Torah She-b'al peh was to illuminate the  
protocol for many things such as T'fillin and Tzitzis.
Therefore, why would there have been conflicting sources when the main  
source is from God?

ri
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Message: 7
From: "kennethgmil...@juno.com" <kennethgmil...@juno.com>
Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2008 02:19:31 GMT
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] induction cooking


R' Micha Berger wrote:
> given that the flame isn't visible, is a blech needed
> altogether, or is ketima effectively done by the
> mechanics of how the food is heated?
> IOW, is ketimah covering the flame, or not having a
> flame to see?
> My take from the gemara is in the case where there is no
> flame to see as too low or high and therefore no chance
> of panic to stoke it, requiring any form of blech is
> already above the minimum of the din.

If I understand you correctly, you would not require a blech on a hot plate or crock pot, because no flame is visible in those devices.

But the Shmiras Shabbos K'Hilchasa 1:24 says that an electric stove needs a
blech even if the heating elements are not visible. And Rav Shimon Eider pg
340 says that if a hotplate has adjustable controls, those controls need to
be taped down or covered before Shabbos.

You can't see the fire, but it *is* possible to see that the food is not yet cooked well enough, and be tempted to adjust the setting.

Akiva Miller

____________________________________________________________
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Message: 8
From: "Danny Schoemann" <doni...@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2008 08:06:57 +0300
Subject:
[Avodah] Feeding fish at Tashlich


In response to my Tashlich post (on "Halocho a Day") various people
wrote in requesting I inform the world that it's forbidden to feed the
fish at Tashlich.

I researched this quickly and found that while on Shabbos you clearly
cannot feed animals that aren't dependent on you (except for stray
dogs) as per SA OC 344, on Yom Tov it's not all that clear.

In OC 497:2 there's a machlokes if you can feed them if you throw the
food at a distance; not directly in front of them. Feeding animals
that you can't eat also seemsto be allowed.

More to the point: In 583:2 where the Remo mentions Tashlich, the
Machazis Hashekel protests vehemently against the Maharil and Eliya
Rabo who advocate feeding the fish.

Clearly feeding the fish is not a 21st century innovation.

Does anybody have a reliable psak, Minhag or Mesora regarding this?

Interestingly enough I can't find Tashlich mentioned in the Oruch
Hashulchon, and somebody told me that the Vilna Gaon was against it -
but I haven't seen a source for that.

Wishing everybody a Shono Tova,

- Danny
http://halocho.blogspot.com



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Message: 9
From: "Meir Rabi" <meir...@optusnet.com.au>
Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2008 16:05:21 +1000
Subject:
[Avodah] Some Additional Observations re: Atonement Erev Yom






I have re-posted the previous submission with two additional notes. I append
these notes both independently at the start of this message and again within
the complete message


1)    In the ShaAr HaTziyun 2 he suggests that mollifying may not be a duty
that is at all bound by time, do it whenever it suits you is almost what the
ChCh seems to be saying.


2)    The source for the MB is noted as the Mateh Afrayim, but the MAfrayim
does not mention this Passuk. The ChAdam mentions it but explains it to mean
that on Rosh HaShana we do not stand beore HKBH but His Beis Din. It is on
YK that we stand before HKBH "Lifney HaShem" and that's why we must mollify
before YK. This is also strange since we are judged on RH so why is the duty
to mollify not before RH? That is apparently the Q bothering the ChAdam but
what is his answer?


Shulchan Oruch Siman 606 discusses the need to mollify those we have hurt.

Although the Siman is titled, "The Duty of Appeasing One's Friend Before Yom
Kippur" the Mechaber does not actually mention the timing. He simply
describes that YK alone will not remedy inter-personal sins until the victim
is mollified; and elaborates on how to go about achieving that.

The Mishneh Berurah however explains that there is an obligation related to
this day that compels us before YK to gain atonement. And this obligation is
quite independent of the personal duty to seek forgiveness by mollifying the
victim. He explains that although there is a duty and obligation all year to
appease, that may somehow get delayed because one has no time. 

I wonder if someone may be able to offer some explanation of what this
means. Which Mitzvos are we obliged to perform but can legitimately delay
because we do not have sufficient time?

In the ShaAr HaTziyun 2 he suggests that mollifying may not be a duty that
is at all bound by time, do it whenever it suits you is almost what the ChCh
seems to be saying.

The MB continues: this day preceding YK brings a NEW obligation to mollify
the victim. This obligation emerges from the Passuk, Ki BaYom HaZeh YeChaper
... This Passuk is not just describing HKBH's kindness in forgiving us but
is obligating us to ensure that on YK we are cleansed and forgiven.

Does anyone know anymore about this obligation?

The source for the MB is noted as the Mateh Afrayim, but the MAfrayim does
not mention this Passuk. The ChAdam mentions it but explains it to mean that
on Rosh HaShana we do not stand beore HKBH but His Beis Din. It is on YK
that we stand before HKBH "Lifney HaShem" and that's why we must mollify
before YK. This is also strange since we are judged on RH so why is the duty
to mollify not before RH? That is apparently the Q bothering the ChAdam but
what is his answer?

I believe the Kaf HaChaim quoting the Tur and the Levush has a different
opinion. The obligation stems from the communal obligation to be clean from
all sin. If any one individual is not repented then the entire community is
vulnerable to the accusations of SamoEl and we may all be denied
forgiveness. It is the community need that compels the individual to mollify
his victim. It would appear to be a very serious example of Arvus - communal
responsibility.

We might observe from this the power of just one individual over the
community and the responsibility that the entire community bears for just
one individual who is too stubborn or arrogant or too weak, to mollify his
victim.

Perhaps the MB intends to refer to the reason suggested in the Tur, that the
Passuk Ki BaYom is directed to the community who have this obligation.







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Message: 10
From: "SBA" <sba...@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2008 16:37:53 +1000
Subject:
Re: [Avodah] Reciting l'Dovid Hashem Ori...


From: "kennethgmil...@juno.com" 
In this whole thread, I have not noticed anything about WHY some do not have
this minhag, other than the idea that it was started by followers of
Shabbetai Tzvi.  Are there any other reasons? 
...I concede that (from some perspectives) the objectionable source could be
enough of a reason to avoid it. It is also quite possible that in some
communities the minhag simply didn't "catch on" and become popular.
>>

I wonder if I have just made an earth-shaking discovery on this matter..

See the Baal Taturim in this week's Parsha  - Pasuk 30:6, dh: 'Es Levovcho
ve'es Levav' - "Roshei Teivos Elul..." 
Then it continues on: "Lulei" (which no doubt refers to "Lulei He'emanti" 
in LeDovid Hashem Ori Veyishi") "oysios Elul - she'mi'Elul vo'eilach
charadti neged Hashem.."

The Baal HaTurim lived approx 300 years before Shabsi Zvi yemach shemoy.

Whaddya think??

SBA

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