I do object to the assumption that anything that might be outside of nature is ruled out of the conversation. That's an impoverished view of the kinds of questions we humans can ask, such as "Why am I here?", "What happens after we die?", "Is there a God?" If you refuse to acknowledge their appropriateness, you end up with a zero probability of God after examining the natural world because it doesn't convince you on a proof basis.

Society bends over backward to be accommodating to religious sensibilities but not to other kinds of sensibilities. If I say something offensive to religious people, I'll be universally censured, including by many atheists.

No doubt soaring cathedrals, stirring music, moving stories and parables, help a bit. But by far the most important variable determining your religion is the accident of birth.

St. Augustine wrote that basically it is not possible to understand what was being described in Genesis. It was not intended as a science textbook. It was intended as a description of who God was, who we are and what our relationship is supposed to be with God.

Certainly science should continue to see whether we can find evidence for multiverses that might explain why our own universe seems to be so finely tuned.

The world and the universe is an extremely beautiful place, and the more we understand about it the more beautiful does it appear.

Steve Grand is the creator of what I think is the nearest approach to artificial life so far, and his first book, Creation: Life and How to Make It, is as interesting as you would expect. But he illuminates more than just the properties of life: his originality extends to matter itself and the very nature of reality. Not since David Deutsch's The Fabric of Reality have I encountered such a compelling invitation to think everything out afresh, from the bottom up.