Can experts now explain the origin of the universe? Many
scientists, uncomfortable with the idea that the universe was created
by a higher intelligence, speculate that by some mechanism it created
itself out of nothing. Does that sound reasonable to you? Such
speculations usually involve some variation of a theory (inflationary
universe model) conceived in 1979 by physicist Alan Guth. Yet, more
recently, Dr. Guth admitted that his theory "does not explain how the
universe arose from nothing." Dr. Andrei Linde was more explicit in a
Scientific American article: "Explaining this initial
singularity—where and when it all began—still remains the most
intractable problem of modern cosmology."

By the way the inflation theory speculates as to what happened a
fraction of a second after the beginning of the universe. Advocates of
inflation hold that the universe was initially submicroscopic and then
inflated faster than the speed of light, a claim that cannot be tested
in a laboratory just like evolution as the origin of man. Inflation
remains a debated theory.