Yes, evolution driven by entirely random/ unguided mechanisms made sense, within the Victorian age understanding of reality when Darwinism was conceived.
But ... that was never the concept that Darwin advanced ... sorry, you've got it wrong. Consider that "selection" is quite the opposite of "random" or "unguided."
But the more we understand, the more non-random mechanisms are getting more attention again e.g. epigenetics, 'natural' engineering. Where an individual's genes can be expressed/ passed on depending on their own individual circumstances
You can drop the strawman anytime now. No ones buying it.
in other words, Giraffes necks got longer because they literally wanted longer necks... this would be a far more plausible process that waiting around for a longer neck to randomly appear by accidental mutation!
No, any advantage meant that those who benefited from it out reproduced those lacking it. Rather common sense.
The problem remains though, the oldest known Giraffe ancestors necks were just as long as today, we don't see the gradual progression happening by any mechanism- and this pretty much goes for the rest of the fossil record
We've been through this one, you are (once again) wrong. Check your sources.
Actually, intelligent design is the only empirically proven method by which such information systems like DNA can be originated, no way around this.
Intelligent Design has never been empirically proven. There is no support (outside of the extreme fringe) for Dembski and friends hypothesis of Complex Specified Information. In fact, it and all of it's underpinnings have been falsified at every turn, at least on a theoretical basis. There appears to be nothing that prevents information systems like DNA from developing, not even your faith that it can't be.
The relationship between biology and information theory given above and other approaches in the literature suggest that the words "biological information", "developmental information" or "genetic information" are ambiguous without clarification. Even then, there will be ambiguity:
In biology the term information is used with two very different meanings. The first is in reference to the fact that the sequence of bases in DNA codes for the sequence of amino acids in proteins. In this restricted sense, DNA contains information, namely about the primary structure of proteins. The second use of the term information is an extrapolation: it signifies the belief or expectation that the genome somehow also codes for the higher or more complex properties of living things. It is clear that the second type of information, if it exists, must be very different from the simple one-to-one cryptography of the genetic code. This extrapolation is based, loosely, on information theory. But to apply information theory in a proper and useful way it is necessary to identify the manner in which information is to be measured (the units in which it is to be expressed in both sender and receiver, and the total amount of information in the system and in a message), and it is necessary to identify the sender, the receiver and the information channel (or means by which information is transmitted). As it is, there exists no generally accepted method for measuring the amount of information in a biological system, nor even agreement of what the units of information are (atoms, molecules, cells?) and how to encode information about their number, their diversity, and their arrangement in space and time.[Nijhout, H. F. Bioessays, September 1990, vol. 12, no. 9; p.443]
Creationists, on the other hand, in a vain attempt to coat their myths with a veneer of science, co-opted this idea of information theory to make a Professor Irwin Corey style, plausible-sounding but nonsensical attack on evolution. The claim is that the genetic code is a "language" that transmits information and with the usual willful misunderstandings of the second law of thermodynamics (that's energy, not information) they preach that information can never be increased.
This is a change from the old tactic that there can be "no beneficial mutations." Because information theory is more difficult for the layman to understand, it is easy to hide behind information theory without really understanding it. It is also intimately related to the "evolution couldn't have possibly have made eyes, wings, or flagella" arguments as well.
So, the changes they cannot outright deny are defined as "losing information", and changes they disagree with are defined as "gaining information", which by their definition is impossible. At no point do the creationists define what information actually is and they (even in the allegedly scientific case of complex specified information) will purposefully avoid defining the concept in any useful way. The creationists tend to change their meaning on an ad hoc basis depending on the argument, relying on colloquial, imprecise definitions of information rather than quantifiable ones -- or worse, switching interchangeably between different definitions depending on the context of the discussion or argument.
The deliberate conflation of the totally unrelated concepts of thermodynamic and informational entropy is, while an obvious flaw in the argument, a flaw that the creationists' intended audience is
less likely to pick up on, so it remains a popular argument.
(thanks, RATIONALWIKI)
