The Great Basilica of Nature

Cambridge University theoretical physicist John D. Barrow, the winner of the 2006 Templeton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realities, is a man of many talents.

The author of 17 books and over 400 journal articles, as well as a play exploring the meaning of infinity, Barrow is perhaps best-known as the co-author, with Tulane University mathematical physicist Frank Tipler, of the 1986 book The Anthropic Cosmological Principle, in which he investigated whether the Earth is indeed fine-tuned for life. Reviewing the book for The New York Times, noted science journalist Timothy Ferris wrote,