Isn't the problem with this discussion (and similar discussions) the result of linguistic confusion? The use of the term "process" when categorising evolution by natural selection?
The word "process" implies a purpose - an objective and therefore a plan. But evolution is purposeless - it is a consequence of random, unplanned, tiny inaccuracies in the process of copying genomes. For the most part, the changes these mutations produce are of no consequence but occasionally one or more may be useful in dealing with a particular environmental condition.
Evolution is not a process but a consequence. The only part of the evolutionary activity which has any connection to being planned is the existence of mutations. However, mutations are blind and most, I speculate, die with their hosts. Another consequence is that if there is an environmental change which is challenging, the vast, overwhelming, number of members of affected organisms die and their genetic potentialities are lost forever.
I recall, some time ago, reading about a piece of woodland in (I think) Devon which had been contaminated by cyanide. Within a very short period the land was bereft of earthworms. The cyanide had poisoned them. However, twenty or so years later it was populated by earthworms which were descended from one which had possessed a mutation making it less susceptible to cyanide. Had the land suffered a different kind of accident, that earthworm would not have survived.
