It says a lot about the "evolution debate" really -- the scientists are just being honest about the fact that it is a "theory" (i.e. a very strong working hypothesis that shows a lot of consistency when compared to reality) and that they might be wrong, who knows. The public, not having had a proper science education, has no idea what this terminology means and takes this as a sign of weakness of the idea, like some crackbrained guy thought it up in the shower and started preaching it to gullible scientists. There's not much you can do but gnash your teeth in response to the old "but it's just a THEORY!!" since those types often don't want to be educated, either. "And yours is a non-provable, non-falsifiable hypothesis!" (*crickets*)
"You have a basic misunderstanding of science" doesn't seem to go very far with them.
You don't hear the creationists carping too often about gravitational theory, and how it's "only a theory", but maybe that's because trying to ignore gravity tends to have immediate, argument-stopping results:
Idiot: Gravity is "only a theory"! Look, I'll prove it by jumping off this cliff. *splat*
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"You have a basic misunderstanding of science" doesn't seem to go very far with them.
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Idiot: Gravity is "only a theory"! Look, I'll prove it by jumping off this cliff.
*splat*
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There are similar articles if you look for them
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