This piques my curiosity on a certain point of interest: Has the argument "It's just an algorithm" ever been used as a counter to the claim that Evolution as a biological phenomenon should not be conflated with "Technological Evolution", "Corporate Evolution", "Personal Evolution", etc.?
More importantly, would there be an efficient way of defusing this potentially mind-killer-route argument without misleading the other party into thinking their assumption is correct when the inferential distance is too large for a technical explanation of the misuse of categories and labels (AKA They're not even aware of Lesswrong's existence and are not trained in scientific thought or rationality)?
Can you be more clear about what types of conflation you find problematic?
If I do a better job representing my clients, then when new lawyer hiring decisions are made, I expect to receive additional clients. Do you feel it is unclear to call that natural selection, or evolution?
I agree that using "evolution" as a synonym for change (i.e. Personal Evolution vs. Personal Self-Improvement) is problematic, but I'm not sure that the quote under discussion helps that issue.
Here's the new thread for posting quotes, with the usual rules: