mdlevine,
I am not knocking the gemara but not everything it says is true. I know i am going to get attacked for saying that, but even alot of great rabbonim have admitted that there are alot of things in the gemara that have been disproven. The gemara says that the gestation period of a snake is 7 years. If you do some simple research on the internet, you will see that is not true. The gemara agrees to disagree. Just because it says it, does not make it so and i know people are going to call names but alot of these things were picked up from the superstitions of the times.