A small caveat: the word ‘evolution’ doesn’t have to refer to the scientific theory of biological evolution. The word existed long before the theory; otherwise, the theory would have become attached to a different word. Since the word itself means “incremental change over time,” then it is perfectly appropriate to refer to a new computer chip design, or a corporate reorganization as evolution. Make your own guesses about whether something totally different, such as uploading a personality, can be called “evolution.”
This. I regularly refer to cultural trends, business models, and technology as undergoing evolution, without the slightest inkling of doubt or shame. Real Life is about compromises to that most obstinate debater Nature, and if one must deal with the pragmatic issue of conveying ideas in a conversation in a short period of time, “evolution” is perfectly acceptable shorthand for “process by which a system becomes incrementally more efficient via an ongoing process of simultaneous diversification and selection, similar to biological evolution if someone were to replace the concept of random genetic variation with human ideas and natural selection with artificial selection.” That simply takes way too long to say.
A small caveat: the word ‘evolution’ doesn’t have to refer to the scientific theory of biological evolution. The word existed long before the theory; otherwise, the theory would have become attached to a different word. Since the word itself means “incremental change over time,” then it is perfectly appropriate to refer to a new computer chip design, or a corporate reorganization as evolution. Make your own guesses about whether something totally different, such as uploading a personality, can be called “evolution.”
This. I regularly refer to cultural trends, business models, and technology as undergoing evolution, without the slightest inkling of doubt or shame. Real Life is about compromises to that most obstinate debater Nature, and if one must deal with the pragmatic issue of conveying ideas in a conversation in a short period of time, “evolution” is perfectly acceptable shorthand for “process by which a system becomes incrementally more efficient via an ongoing process of simultaneous diversification and selection, similar to biological evolution if someone were to replace the concept of random genetic variation with human ideas and natural selection with artificial selection.” That simply takes way too long to say.