Aiwendil, agreeing up to a point, I will risk going a bit off the Tolkien track and elaborate on 'why'-s and 'how'-s a bit more.
Indeed, 'why'-s and 'how'-s are interchangeable, unless you reach the ultimate end (or beginning).
In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded is the funniest explanation of the origins ot our world I’ve ever heard (by Terry Pratchett), and, even if modern M-theory of 11 dimensional membranes hitting each other and causing Big Bang may explain ‘how’ the world came about, it does not tell me ‘why’ there were such membranes in the first place.
So, questions of ‘why this three is growing’ type may be answered by both faith and science, and even ‘why the universe is like to what it is’ as well, But to simpify it other way round, all the ‘why’-s science gives answer to, can be viewed as ‘how’’s as well - why is there a spectral line here in the light from that star?" "Because there's neutral hydrogen in that star, and x, y, and z are facts about neutral hydrogen" = the spectral line we get if x is added up to y and z = how.
But there is a question where ‘how’ given by science does not equal ‘why’. That’d be the question of.
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"why does the world exist?" "Because God exists, and God wants the world to exist".
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You give me my sword here. For you pose the question, answer as I would have answered it in case I needed “why” type of answer and than shift on to give an example of ‘how’ question of starshine – that is, the ‘how’ particular part of the world, not the world as a whol.,
True, the ‘because’ given by faith to that last question is not based on emirical fact, and can not be viewed as valid in case one counts only answers backed up by empirical data as valid. But given that faith is just about relying on authority without sufficient data, we are in a deadlock here – unless either of us changes position, i.e., I agree that only empirical proof is valid, or you agree that there is no need for the proof to be backed up by empirical data, we don’t agree
On to ME now. Agreeing with much of SpM-s excellent post, I’ll risk saying that ME (at least Hither Lands, as in Aman there are folks who have empirical back up to their trust in Eru), given its ‘internal lows’ = Primary World on the moral plane, in case of faith and science relationship.
On that last paragraph I'll have to elaborate later, though - too much on my hands right now