I think “preferentially” is a more appropriate word than "intellectually " in this context.
Fascinating too, no doubt.
That is not an insult when we are talking about good science and the truth of physical reality, the natural realm that God created. What point are you trying to make? None successfully, certainly.
(Am I arguing like an atheist when I insist you get the context right when I’m talking about God’s providential interventions into the lives of his children? 
)
As a Christian, I assume you believe that God created the universe out of nothing … 
Poof
As a Christian, I assume you believe that Jesus instantly created a living human being (a certain Lazarus) from inanimate matter (the deceased Lazarus) … Poof
Yet you scoff at the suggestion that God might have created the hollow fangs of a venomous snake. That’s fascinating “Christian” logic, to say the least.
Yet Genesis tells us that God made the animals by commanding the Earth and sea to bring forth living creatures – it doesn’t say He designed them or that He made them individually.
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God doesn’t break the laws of nature when he doesn’t have to – you just want him to be a magician. Sometimes he breaks the laws of nature it to teach a lesson. But plenty of times he doesn’t.
I fully believe in God’s omnipotence – I just don’t have to force his breaking the laws of nature into places where it doesn’t belong and where in fact it denies reality and spreads a lie.
I do believe God created the hollow fangs of venomous snakes… slowly and meticulously through evolution, and I fully credit him for them. But I don’t have to deny reality nor confuse VFB with VFA.
Have you looked at a dental X-ray of your teeth lately? Hey, they they have hollow centers! Geneticists could probably show us where we have similar DNA sequences to venomous snakes. Guess what! Hollow fangs do not refute evolution.
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There are atheists who want God to exist, but reluctantly are convinced otherwise.
There are many first hand accounts. Some lost their faith while almost desperately trying to believe, but eventually lost out due to the cognitive dissonance in their minds. For others it was easier; to them just made better sense of the world. To understand others, you have to first listen to them.
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Snake fangs aren’t soft tissue. Any sign in the fossil record of snakes evolving hollow fangs? Probably not.
Sure … now all you have to is provide evidence of the small changes and explain what caused them … as opposed to just saying, “Evolution done it”. Good luck with that.
Saying, “Time and small incremental changes can do a lot” (aka, “Evolution done it”) hardly qualifies as an explanation.
I never offered that explanation … or any explanation, for that matter.
Ooh, I feel sssso ssspecial!
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Well, I wouldn’t know about that … since I’m not God, I have no idea what God has to do or doesn’t have to do viz-a-viz his creation.
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But we watch those incremental changes all the time. It’s just arithmetic to recognize that continuing incremental changes with result in what look like big changes.
And I say “what look like” because evolution isn’t about big changes; big changes are extremely rare, it’s all about the accumulation of little changes.
[One example of “big changes” is the discovery after the Battle of Britain of new species of plants here and there around bomb craters – heat and pressure and chemicals brought about big enough changes that it took some work to figure out what the precursor species had been.]
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You have no evidence that “God created the hollow fangs of venomous snakes… slowly and meticulously through evolution”.
Neither can you explain how “God created the hollow fangs of venomous snakes… slowly and meticulously through evolution”.
All you have is a Darwinist story.
I know that human teeth are hollow and can certainly allow that since they are hollow, there is genetic similarity. Genetics is not Darwinist story.
God also has a sense of humor and irony :
Firstly, you have no evidence that “incremental changes” led to a venonmous snake’s hollow fangs … and ditto for many other morphological features that appear in the fossil record or are evident in extant organisms.
Secondly, observing changes is one thing … explaining what caused the changes is another.
Hi Dale, @jpm and @Buzzard . I’m not a snake expert but there seems to be recent research out in 2021 showing that the snake’s tooth itself isn’t hollow. Rather there is a separate channel that formed by a folding-over of an external tooth ridge. A morphological tooth feature that all snakes have, but which has developed to be longer in venomous compared to non-venomous snakes. The article describes the new function the ridge took on in poisonous snakes and how it is simple to see how this gradually developed to be longer as it took on the function of directing venom.
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Cool, thanks! I’m happy to have my layman’s conjectures corrected by the science, and more than incidentally correcting @Buzzard’s. It illustrates exaptation nicely and I like the origami analogy.
@Buzzard: Be sure to read it. Hey, and Australia is mentioned twice! (And you seem to have had no rejoinder for this. ; - )
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Thanks. I will read it but I expect it’ll be as lame, weak, far-fetched and untestable as other “explanations” I’ve read … Darwinists clutching at straws, making up pseudo-scientiifc stories, vainly attempting to scientifically explain something that defies scientific explanation.
See my post above …
Basically @Dale (and @St.Roymond ) sees no problem talking aetheistic science because science is atheistic. He has successfully separated his faith from his scientific knowledge. The two do not mix and he has no problem with this.
You and I do have a problem with it but he can’t see why.
All this VFA & VFB is just a smokescreen to cover the fact that he does not see the need to talk as a Christian all the time. He has successfully compartmentalised his faith and his science.
Richard
Nice to know you have an open mind to learning!