Well, it does have to do with the preconditions for the development of life. It is the basis for any notion of macroevolution. But my point is that non-biologists see evidence of order in the universe that does benefit us, and so the question arises: is there a benefactor behind it all? IAC, our science presupposes a discernible order, of meaningful patterns. It is said that Newton, even as a children, weas enchanted by patterns, and after he acquired the mathematical tools to work with, and sufficient knowledge of the physics and astronomy of the day, was moved to create a system that has served us to this day, much as Euclid’s geometry still does. Kant’s epistomology has infected out thinking, and so we tend to think that we are just projecting our meaning on things, much as discern animal shapes in the clouds, on Madonnas on pie crusts. I don’t necessarily agree with Behe and the rest, but don’t they have the right to suggest that maybe, just maybe Darwin and his followers might be doing a little projecting of their own? For example, we have the capitulation scheme cooked upby Haeckel(?) in the 19th Century, which proposed that the shapes of developing fetuses show all the stages of human evolution, from single-cell to human? Later observers decided that this was a little too clever by half. Scientists are not unlike the rest of us: they leap to conclusions, because they wish things to be just so.
Once again why Scientists are not doing apologetics. If we were we would be embracing Haeckel as dogma and like Creationists would be denying that the evidence was there, decrying the motivations of those who discovered the contradictory information, or coming up with a convoluted explanation why those were not contrary examples. Instead Biologists went where the data lead them, and supported only what the data would support. Not many proponents of a Lamarkianism or Geocentricism around in the Scientific community anymore.
As far as Molecular Evolution, the pattern is there, and it is there every time one looks, and in predictable amounts of difference or similarity depending upon the type of sequence and the evolutionary similarity of the two species. The significance of the data can be calculated, and the idea that all our similarity to chimps at the Molecular level are the result of common design is ludicrous considering the similarity of our nonfunctional elements, and our similarity in redundant codons.
One is right to suggest that Darwin or any other Scientist might have been off base; but one must do so with data and measurable and predictable forces, not appeals to ‘it seems frighteningly difficult and complex so GODDIDIT wherever there was a hurdle we find difficult to explain’, that is if you wish to mount a SCIENTIFIC challenge to a theory. If all you want to do is sell books to credulous creationists well not much more is required.