The Problem with Christians

[athrock]

I don't see why complexity cannot emerge or evolve naturally, but the general idea of Intelligent Design (I think) is that the Designer was not designed by anyone or thing nor did it emerge naturally.

It's reasonable to say that whatever begins to exist must have a cause. For example, a cornbread muffin does not simply exist on its own or bring itself into existence. The cause of its existence is a baker. This principle of causation holds regardless of how big or small the thing in question may be – whether it is a muffin, a house, a planet or the entire universe. And if the universe began to exist, and scientists seem to agree that it did, then the universe had a cause.

This is conflating creation ex materia with creation ex nihilo.  The muffin is created ex materia.  The universe is posited to have been created ex nihilo.  The two are not equivalent cases.

You are right, Jorm. But does this muffin analogy actually damage the overall argument? Or is it generally useful? 

If you were walking alone in the woods and you came upon black metal box with hinges and a padlock in the middle of the trail, would your first thought be like that of Bertrand Russell, "Well, locked black boxes like this just are, and that's all there is to it"? Or would you assume implicitly that someone made the box, locked it, and placed it in the path?

And if the box can be presumed to have a maker, why not something larger...like a house, for instance? Or an aircraft carrier? Or a planet or even the universe itself? Does the size of the thing in question really change our willingness to conceive of its maker?

Further, if something exists, there must also exist that which is necessary for that thing to exist. So, if the universe – that is, the sum of all physical matter, space, and time – exists, there must also exist whatever is necessary for the universe to exist. But, that which is necessary cannot be part of the universe, exist within it or be bounded by space and time because nothing that is within the universe can bring itself into existence. In other words, whatever is necessary for the universe to exist must be outside the universe and transcend both space and time. So, if the universe began to exist, it must have had a cause which is outside the universe itself and which transcends both space and time.

This is an abduction from the basic result and thus requires verification, which you obviously can't provide.  We have no way of inferring the accuracy of your claims here.  Thus the reasoning is pure conjecture.

And how reasonable is that conjecturing, Jorm? Pretty good? Yes.  

You're dancing around the issue: if something (real, physical, material) exists, then everything that is necessary for its existence must also exist.

If you think otherwise, demonstrate an example.

Going further still, the apparent fine-tuning of the universe which was necessary for the existence of life suggests the existence of an intelligent designer.

Design is something either evolved brains or created souls do.  If you insist that it was souls, then you're begging the question of the existence of the theist worldview.  If evolved brains, then the analogy from human design is flawed because God is not a similar designer and thus constitutes an unrelated phenomenon.  Since design, even if true, may point to a naturalistic designer, you have made no headway on demonstrating a supernatural God.

I'm not arguing for "created souls"; I'm arguing for an uncreated, necessary, Intelligent Designer who must have existed outside of space before they were created.