Creationism should be taught in UK schools

[Surlethe]

I remember reading a physics textbook in High School that started off by saying that science is a way of knowing how things happen, and that religion is a way of knowing why things happen.

What imbecile published this textbook?

Interestingly, my uni modern physics textbook (Modern Physics, 2nd edition, Kenneth S. Krane, published 1996 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.) has this to say:

• The second vexing question concerns the "why" of these theories. Why does Nature behave according to Einstein's relativity, rather than according to Galileo's? Why do particles sometimes behave as waves, and waves sometimes as particles? Why do atoms join to form compounds? Why do higher forms of life evolve from lower forms? Although scientists can provide extremely precise answers to the "how" of these theories, they cannot provide the answers to the "why," not because their powers of observation or experimental abilities are limited, but rather because the questions are outside the realm of experimentation. These questions are of extreme importance, and as potential practitioners of pure or applied science you should be aware of them and spend some time thinking about them. If answers to these questions are to be found at all, they will be found not in the field of science, but in the fields of philosophy or theology. As you begin to study the facts of mdoern science, you should keep these additional questions in mind and perhaps seek your instructor's opinions concerning them. Although such speculations are an exciting intellectual endeavor in their own right, they will not be discussed in this text.
  (p. 15, hardcover)

[Kanastrous]

• The second vexing question concerns the "why" of these theories. Why does Nature behave according to Einstein's relativity, rather than according to Galileo's?

Because Einstein's relativity is a more accurate description, than Galileo's presumably was.

Why do particles sometimes behave as waves, and waves sometimes as particles?

Because particles do their thing, whatever that may be, and seeing wave/particle duality is a condition of being a human observer.

Why do atoms join to form compounds?

Because their structure dictates their behavior, and this is the behavior dictated by their structure.

Why do higher forms of life evolve from lower forms?

Because an accumulation of survival-assisting traits gives you what we tend to term a 'higher' life form, and long periods of time combined with random mutations and survival pressures don't leave much alternative.

Answering these particular questions seems pretty trifling, to me, without anything that an actual scientist would recognize as much of a 'science education.'

I'm looking forward to seeing the explanation, as to why I'm wrong.

[Admiral Valdemar]

You didn't answer why they do that at all. The arbitrary nature of the universal laws has no cut and dry answer. Might as well ask why the inverse square law applies, or why the speed of light is the speed it is.

No scientist concerns himself with why c is the speed it is. That's just how the universe came to be. What matters is how we derived that figure and what we can use it for. Asking the why of nature's fundamental laws is a fool's errand.