Quote from john dough:
I've already stated that I have no argument with the proposition that evolution is channeled by environmental conditions. So if the environment is non-random, then the distribution curve of evolutionary change will be non-random.
However, this has nothing to do with whether evolution is designed by an alien intelligence, which is what you are asserting.
Taken as a whole, the Earth's environment in any particular locale, is not predictable in advance. It is only historically ascertainable.
So, to say that evolution is non-random because the environment causes life forms with mutations to be selected according to a different probability distribution than would occur were the environment one that never changed, is silly.
Yes, evolutionary change can be channeled by local environment, but the environment cannot be predicted in advance, therefore it is random over the long haul, UNLESS you provide an experiment showing that the local environment has been guided by an external intelligence.
Example: we know for a fact that urban areas are designed by humans, and that there are life forms which have undergone changes in order to adapt to the environment.
But, that evidence is readily available. If you have verifiable evidence of some alien terraforming the African savanna 4.5 million years ago, and, then let's see it.
It would certainly be big news. However, absent the prove, you have nothing but a hypothesis. So, the scientist will say that evolution has effectively progressed without extrinsic intelligent guidance, because there is no evidence to the contrary, and a lot of evidence in favor -- including your cited article, which supports the position that environmental stress causes evolutionary change.
... think of it as a mild form of paranoid response / way of dealing with uncertainty...