Dr. Philip Skell – a chemist of some renown at Penn State – wrote an open letter (May 12, 2005) to Dr. Steve Abrams, Chair of the Kansas State Board of Education, saying in part, “I am writing – as a member of the National Academy of Sciences – to voice my strong support for the idea that students should be able to study scientific criticisms of the evidence for modern evolutionary theory along with the evidence favoring the theory. . . . None of the great discoveries in biology and medicine over the past century depended on guidance from Darwinian evolution – it provided no support.” ¹

In a puzzling development in the confrontational Kansas School Board hearing regarding the teaching of alternatives to evolutionism, it was announced that some secular science organizations would snub the proceedings.

This is strange because if evolutionism (i.e. macroevolution, or the “particles-to-people” theory) was as sound as its proponents maintain, it would seem Darwinists would embrace the opportunity to use the Kansas hearings as a sounding board to list evolution’s scientific facts.

Secular science groups such as the evolution-based American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) declined to enter into the Kansas deliberations, while the anti-creation group, Kansas Citizens for Science called for a boycott, claiming the hearing was “rigged.”

CNN.com reports that board members were quite rightly frustrated because the Kansas Board of Education hearings were to be seen “as an educational forum.” Indeed, what better way to expose students to the topic of origins, as well as the democratic process?

CNN quoted Connie Morris, a Kansas board member as saying, “I would have enjoyed hearing what they [the evolutionists] have to say in a professional, ethical manner.” ²

Both creation scientists and those skeptical of macroevolution’s claims are suspicious regarding this development. Could it be that when macroevolution is critically viewed, it will be seen only as minor changes greatly extrapolated beyond what science can observe?