No. Because evolutionary biology is about the dynamics of the biosphere. The biosphere certainly, in all naturalistic accounts of the origin of currently extant life-forms, most assuredly preexists life as we know it.
The point of my observation is that it moves the argument from design to a much grander scale — while the eye might be designed by the biosphere functioning as an intelligent agent through the mechanisms suggested by the Darwinian paradigm, much as novel complex computer code optimized for some purpose is designed by a program running autonomously following a Darwinian paradigm,* without new coding by a programmer — the question of the origin of a large complex dynamical system which functions as an intelligent agent (the biosphere) is not addressed by evolutionary biology and is not satisfactorily answered by naturalistic account, any more than the question of the origin of a computer program and digital computer is addressed by Hutter’s theory of intelligent agents modeled by interacting (possibly stochastic, or even quantum) Turing machines.
*Yes, do a search on current work in AI. “Evolved” programs, not coded by anything other than another program that interacts with input are cutting edge. They are also, mistakenly, pointed to by atheist polemicists as “proving” that the argument from design is invalid. This is part of why “mainstream” ID is off base — it’s trying to prove some external designer hand-built molecular machines, when it’s the whole dynamical system that is arguing for design, not the little bits of living stuff it constructs.
“The biosphere certainly, in all naturalistic accounts of the origin of currently extant life-forms, most assuredly preexists life as we know it.”
Huh? A biosphere is a collection of ecosystems, and you can’t have an ecosystem without living organisms. Without living organisms, the ecosystem is reduced to simply an environment, like we have on Mars, or Venus.
“...the question of the origin of a large complex dynamical system which functions as an intelligent agent (the biosphere) is not addressed by evolutionary biology and is not satisfactorily answered by naturalistic account”
Yes, we can agree on that, but that’s not the extent of the problem, as I see it. If you concede that a designer is required for the diversification of life once it exists, then you have essentially conceded that a designer is required for the origin of life. Otherwise, whence come the essential elements of life, which are just as complex as the diverse forms they supposedly evolve into?
Darwinists avoid that question by positing blind, unintelligent forces can produce complexity, but if you concede the need for a designer to produce complexity then you must be consistent and explain how the original complexity appeared without a designer, or you have an incomplete theory.
No scientist is going to agree with explanations which anthropomorphize a pre-existing "biosphere" as the Intelligent Designer of life on Earth.
The only Intelligent Designer who can, and indeed must, exist is the Creator of the basic physics and chemistry of the Universe -- nothing lesser can serve the purpose, FRiends.