DAVID: Do animals have control over their evolution through choosing minor changes in habits that modify their bodies:-"What they are saying is something subtler. Over their lifetimes, living things make all sorts of adjustments to their physical being - what biologists call the phenotype, as opposed to the genetic make-up, or genotype - to get along better in the environment they find themselves in. They grow differently based on how they use their bodies, they turn certain genes on and others off, they learn new behaviours, and so on.
"None of these changes count as evolution, because they don't directly change the organism's genetic make-up. But they do shape the way natural selection acts on these genes, and in that way they push evolution in a different direction. In effect, the genes, which we have always thought of as occupying the driver's seat, have slid over to let the phenotype take the wheel. When the phenotype changes for some purpose, the genes that enhance that response might come along for the ride."

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22029380.700-lifes-purpose-can-animals-guide-thei...

QUOTE: Jablonka thinks the evolution of associative learning may have been what sparked the Cambrian explosion, the relatively sudden burst of diversification that produced almost all of today's animal phyla about 550 million years ago. If she is right, then we owe almost everything - from the diversity of animal life to human culture - to the ability of organisms to direct evolution towards useful ends.-This article appeared in print under the headline "Life's purpose"-This and the quote below are worth noting for two reasons. 1) You think God's purpose was to create humans, though you refuse to speculate on why he would want to do such a thing. Here we have the proposal that the organisms themselves direct evolution towards useful ends - which I summarized earlier as survival and improvement. An end in itself.-QUOTE: 
Gambling on evolution
Might organisms be able to order up mutations, exactly when they need them? The idea is far from proven, but not as far-fetched as you might think.-2) Perhaps, then, I am not alone in thinking that organisms might possess an inventive mechanism which enables them to innovate. As your own quotes show, the article does not go that far, and still clings to random mutations as the main supplier of innovation. But the above is clearly heading in the direction of my hypothesis. We simply don't know the extent of control that cells/cell communities have over their own development.

The stress causes changes in sperm as described in this study in mice:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/02/180216110547.htm

"New research in mice has found that a father's stress affects the brain development of his offspring. This stress changes the father's sperm, which can then alter the brain development of the child. This new research provides a much better understanding of the key role that fathers play in the brain development of offspring.

"Scientists have known that a mother's environment during pregnancy, including factors such as poor diet, stress or infection, can cause damage negatively impact her offspring. This may be due in part to how this environment affects the expression of certain genes -- known as epigenetics.

***

"Previously, Bale had found that adult male mice experiencing chronic periods of mild stress have offspring with a reduced response to stress; changes in stress reactivity have been linked to some neuropsychiatric disorders, including depression and PTSD. She and her colleagues isolated the mechanism of the reduced response; they found that the father's sperm showed changes in genetic material known as microRNA. MicroRNA are important because they play a key role in which genes become functional proteins.

"Now, Bale and her colleagues have unraveled new details about these microRNA changes. In the male reproductive tract, the caput epididymis, the structure where sperm matures, releases tiny vesicles packed with microRNA that can fuse with sperm to change its cargo delivered to the egg. The caput epididymis responded to the father's stress by altering the content of these vesicles.

"This suggests that even mild environmental challenges can have a significant impact on the development and potentially the health of future offspring."

Comment: Lamarck is alive and well.

DES in pregnancy is shown to affects future generations:

https://cosmosmagazine.com/biology/banned-pregnancy-med-still-affecting-daughters-grand...

"The grandchildren of women who used a drug called diethylstilbestrol, or DES, during pregnancy have a higher risk of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), new research shows.

"Endocrine-disruptors are chemicals that interfere with the body’s intricate hormone system, and have been associated with a number of neurological disorders, including ADHD. Increasing evidence suggests they can alter the epigenetic programming of reproductive cells. In other words, they can cause heritable changes in gene activity.

"Animal studies show that endocrine disruptors, such as di(2ethylhexyl)phthalate (DEHP) and bisphenol A (BPA), are indeed linked with negative neurological effects in subsequent generations, but it was unknown if this was also the case for humans.

***

"DES was prescribed to millions of women between 1938 and 1971, because it was thought to prevent miscarriage. However, a 1953 study showed it to be ineffective. Another study in 1971 revealed increased rates of vaginal cancer in the daughters of women who had taken it, and it was banned that same year.

"DES, it turned out, was a potent endocrine disruptor.

"The new research examined the self-reported health information of 47,540 participants enrolled in the ongoing study. Of these, nearly 2% had mothers who had used DES during pregnancy. Moreover, many of the nurses in the cohort had gone on to have children of their own.

“'Our aim was to explore the potential impact of DES use across generations, and specifically on third-generation neurodevelopment,” says the study’s first-author, Marianthi-Anna Kioumourtzoglou of the Columbia University Mailman Institute of Public Health.

***

"The findings revealed that grandchildren of the women who had used DES were 36% more likely to have ADHD than grandchildren of women who had not used the drug, regardless of whether those grandchildren were male or female.

"The findings provide evidence in humans that exposure to endocrine disruptors during pregnancy can alter neurodevelopment in later generations.

“'While DES is banned, pregnant women continue to be exposed to a large number of environmental endocrine disruptors,” says co-author Marc Weisskopf of Harvard.
“And although current exposures are at a lower level and potency than seen with DES, cumulative exposures to these chemicals may be cause for concern and is deserving of further study.'”

Comment: Autism was unknown when I was in Med school. Alzheimer very rare. we live in a chemical world and don't fully understand it. We are too smart for our own good.