Science and Religion are orthogonal

Science describes how things work. Religion tells why things are the way they are. The two do not oppose each other but each is a part of knowing about things.

In mathematics when we graph an equation with two variables, X and Y, the two axises are at right angles (orthogonal) to each other. The value of X and Y are independent of each other until the equation is considered. With different equations the value of Y is different for a value of X. For example: for the equation X=Y, when X=2 then Y=2, and for the equation 3X=Y, Y=6 when X is the same value of 2.

How (science) and why (religion) are the variables, X and Y, in the graph of the equation of existence. The domain of Science is the physical and the domain of Religion is the spiritual. Knowing how things work does not tell us why they work. Neither does knowing why tell us how they work. You need both to fully understand existence.

However there are two problems. The first is that different groups of people have different ideas of why things happen. The second problem is that some people confuse the why and the how.

There are different religions in our world. Native Americans view the why different than Christians and both are different than Pagans to name three of the hundreds of belief systems or religions. For each the equation of existence is different so the why is different for the how. Which is the true and correct equation?

Some people confuse the how and why. Because the how and why are related they get confused and think they are same thing. Distance and altitude are both measured in feet but they are not the same. You should not confuse the altitude of a city and distance to a city if you want to drive there. If you do get the two confused you might run out of gas or time.

Many of the people who are pushing Intelligent Design have the how and why confused. The idea of why of the changes in evolution occur the way they do has nothing to do with the fact that evolution occurs. The rest of the people who are pushing Intelligent Design just want to teach their brand of religion in the public schools.

The people pushing Intelligent Design do not have any idea of what science is about.