These questions have always fascinated me. While I may be as close as I think a person can reasonably get, I still find the search continues. I have found science to be a powerful process to find answers to how the world works. And yet to be clear, it gives answers to us as a people as well as to individuals. I have also found it really only answer questions starting with 'how'.
Science gives cause only in an immediate sense.
For ultimate cause, we need faith and that goes beyond what science can answer. I like it all. I am slightly better informed in biology and chemistry. I have an intense interest in how science and technology interplay with society and history. It's a quark.