Ah, but evolution isn't driven randomly. Billions of mutations are happening all the time, most of them either harmful (they get washed out) or neutral (they're ignored). Given that raw material to work with, the changing environment rather ruthlessly filters out whatever isn't right for the time. And that's not random. It can be modeled, with great advantage.
Specific examples of Genetic Algorithms. Practical applications galore!
True, but randomly occuring mutations (random with respect to the selection function) will yield a system that moves with jumps of all sizes.
There is also the genotype-phenotype relationship. It may take several small changes in genotype to make any change at all in phenotype. Likewise, some small genotypical changes may result in large phenotypical change.
I think that "random" here would be shorthand for "mutation not necessarily related to selection."