pjones: First, as to the term theory.

One, the people that tend to emphasize the word theory in "theory of evolution" are the same people who want to use that to mean "hypothesis". Evolution is certainly a theory according to the scientific definition, as is gravity, and lots of other things.

Two, Newtonian Mechanics fail on macro scales too. In fact, one of the original confimations of relativity was that it correctly predicted the procession of Mercury's orbit, while Newtonian physics mispredicted this by 43 arc seconds per century. See this page, about 2/3 of the way down, for more info.

Second, as to the reliability of measurements.

It is certainly possible for an all-powerful God to have fabricated the evidence for evolution, if such a God were to

exist. However, once we allow this, then all of science goes out the window quite quickly. How can we know anything about the world, if all of our sensory perception could be fabricated? Clearly, we can't. So we are left with a few choices:

1. Abandon all study of reality as futile.
2. Invoke a loving God to ensure that nobody tricks us.
3. Assume that our sensory perception is not being fabricated by some powerful being.

I don't like choice 1 much, for obvious reasons. Choice 2 is a cop-out of the highest order, and is what Descartes chose, when confronted with this problem. This leaves choice 3.

Therefore, since I see belief that our senses are being faked as an abandonment of science, claiming that the evidence for an old earth has been faked is similar. At least, that's what I'm left with.