01:00 AM EST on Thursday, December 2, 2004

I found myself quite disappointed with Bryan Rourke's Nov. 26 article, "Brown professor on the frontline of school battle over evolution." It glaringly ignored what I consider to be Prof. Kenneth Miller's most important contribution to the evolution debate.

During my days at Brown University, I had the pleasure of being taught by Ken Miller, the author of a truly wonderful book, Finding Darwin's God. Sadly, the Rourke article neglected to even mention this seminal work, instead referring to Miller's popular high-school biology textbook. Through this omission, Rourke's readers missed out on the much needed and refreshing perspective that Miller brings to the evolution debate.

For what was left out -- what is indeed so revolutionary about Miller's work -- is not that it undeniably validates the theory of evolution; countless others already claim to do this. Rather, it demonstrates how belief in God is not necessarily contrary to belief in evolutionary theory. This is indeed a quite groundbreaking notion, contrary to the partisanship typical of most evolutionary debates, in which "creationism" and evolution are passionately presented as diametrically opposed.

Instead of blindly following such rhetoric, Ken Miller teaches us to ask important questions such as "Why couldn't God work through evolution?" As a scientist and practicing Catholic, Professor Miller clearly has much to teach us.

TOM LeBLANC

Durham, N.C.

The writer is a medical student at Duke University, where he is also studying philosophy.