What I mean with the card game analogy is that the distribution of the cards is random, but that doesn’t mean that there is no purpose among the contestants of the game.
My purpose is to win.
In evolution the purpose is to pass on genes to subsequent generations.
Just because mutation is random doesn’t mean that there is no purpose behind mutation. For example, a bacteria under stress will deliberately increase its own mutation rate.
Also, just because mutation is random doesn’t mean that the fossils we find are just as likely to be wildly mutated as consistent with its cohorts. That is like insisting that in a poker contest between a world class gambler and me, each of us should be equally likely to win, because the card distribution is random.
Yet there seems to me to be a critical, irreconcilable difference between the bacterium's ability to "deliberately" increase its own mutation rate and the prediction of random purposelesseness in nature — which leaves all questions of "deliberation" out of consideration altogether at all times, regardless of the question.
Let me put this question to you plainly, allmendream: In a deterministic world, where does "deliberation" fit in?
Meanwhile, I continue to worry about your invocation of purpose in nature. Dontcha know, such a view is poison to the advancement of a career in science nowadays?