Evolution, as is currently modeled, is a blend of logic and dice/cards. Natural selection is rational, being based on selective pressures that come from the environment, based on the laws of physics and nature. If it was a cold place, selection will be based on what can best endure the cold; cause and effect. The dice and cards come in via the genetic aspect of the model; random mutations. Darwin tried to stay rational; just natural selection and breeding. It is modern biology that added dice and cards. It was part of a trend in science, that started in 1920's Physics, that led to the end of the golden age; movement to black box science away from rational science.
It is those dice and cards, that make it pseudo-science. The random addendum is there to fill in lack of logic. If one had a reasonable theory, for genetic change who would resort to dice and cards? It is an admission of not being a fully rational theory. Odds allow you to have a source of faith in the unknown future or past, making it a religion. If you can reason the future, you do not need faith. Natural selection offers a way to anticipate the future based on local pressures. But the dice and cards; mutation, needs faith, since you cannot reason that detail. It is fortune telling and blind man's prophesy.
If we throw dice, the rolls will appear random in the short term, but each side will repeat in the longer term. If we assume genetic dice, over time, like dice, they should repeat, even if randomly. Natural selection, as you said, will have changed its variables for selection. However, even though these repeats may not be selected, we as scientists should be able find living examples of these not selected, repeats. The double sixes should appear here and there, so even if the rules of the game change; natural selection evolves, double sixes still come up. They may not be selected, but they should still come up to be observed. Is that the case?
Below is an interesting observation about a small fern plant. It currently holds the record for the largest DNA, with 50 times the DNA of humans. Size of DNA does not matter in terms of the level of sophistication of life. It is not the meat but the motion. You cannot just add DNA and get a Einstein Tree.
Would it make more sense to have selective pressure not just from the environment, but also internally at the nano-scale via the nature of the chemicals used? Life and DNA use hydrogen bonding, as does water. This is nanoscale selection. Life evolved in water, so the meat and potato chemicals of life should shares this secondary bonding with water; internal chemical environment for natural selection. This replaces the random assumption with chemical logic.
My approach uses the logic of natural selection, but at both the macro and micro levels. Where they meet we have evolution. Life is an extremely complex integration of parts, that scales into the multicellular with billions of integrated cells that also integrate with each other. You need internal and external cooperation to sustain and evolve.
This Tiny Fern Has the World's Largest Known Genome