Has Science Shown Some Things Begin to Exist Without Cause?

An important premise in some arguments for God’s existence is that anything that begins to exist has a cause. That is, things that come into being don’t just pop into existence for no reason. There is some cause that explains why that thing started to exist when it did. There is a causal story involving your parents that explains why you exist, for instance, and it would be odd, to say the least, if there weren't. This premise – anything that beings to exist has a cause - seems intuitive, reasonable and attractive to most people. Check out the video below for a neat summary of one argument for God’s existence – the Kalam Cosmological Argument – that features this premise.  

We’ll call this premise the causal premise or “CP” for short. In an argument featuring CP it will usually be other, more controversial premises that draw critical discussion. In the Kalam Cosmological Argument, it is more common to question the second premise’s claim that the universe began to exist than to question CP. Most critical discussion of Kalam centres on whether we really do have good scientific evidence or philosophical arguments for thinking that the universe has a finite history. But sometimes CP draws critical attention and is challenged too.

Michelangelo of the Gaps

Ask a typical geologist, or even a competent GCSE student, how sand forms on the beach and you can expect a step by step procedure as large chunks of rock are split and weathered by the relentless beating of the ocean tides. This is a very slow, perfectly natural process that has been going on for millennia.
Ask how the famous Giant's causeway came about, those striking arrays of hexagonal pillars rising out of the sea on the Irish coast. You'll get a story that starts violently, with a rush of lava at hundreds of degrees, but again is both perfectly natural and unguided.
Ask about any rock form of any size on any continent, and through the gnarled roots of trees, the whipping of the desert winds, the pounding of rivers or the surging of magma from far below us they will provide an explanation, and for the most part those explanations will be perfectly solid.

Now ask instead about David.  The seventeen foot tall marble replica of a man, complete with muscles, bones, joints, and even sideburns, has and can have no unguided natural explanation. The only explanation that explains this phenomenon is the meticulous planning and dexterous hand of the great Renaissance artist and sculptor Michaelangelo. Geologists all agree with the accepted account of the origin of this sculpture, even as they agree on the natural processes that formed the smooth river stones the original David used in his most famous accomplishment.