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Alister McGrath's awesome points in his talk

Augustine's seminal reasons as an example of an evolution-compatible understanding of the origin of life forms evolution. My response: what is marvelous about this example is that it shows that the Christian understanding of Genesis is by no means married to the fixity of the species, etc.

JH Newman, paraphrased: I believe in design because I believe in God, rather than vice versa. This quote captures a central point in the essay, is that the calibration of the universe to the conditions necessary for life is a fact that a Christian is able to make sense of...not about proving but about how fruitful, coherent the Christian worldview is.

He criticizes Carter for coining the term "anthropic principle" when his arguments show how the universe is fine tuned so that life generaliter may arise. Hence he proposes that "biocentric principle" would have been a more suitable term than "anthropic."


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