Sort of. I'm not sure exactly how it works, but the AI identifies some wonders as "early wonders" and uses a different decision making process to determine whether to build the wonder or not, whereas the later wonders supposedly are handled closer to the "old way". I suspect the AI's decision regarding the early wonders includes taking into account that you usually have to start early to get them.
edit: actually, thinking about it I'm not sure that they included this tweak in the warlords patch since it's one of thew changes in BtS, but seeing as the patch came out at the same time I just assumed that was the case.
