rationalskepticism.org

pfrankinstein wrote:

Spearthrower wrote:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equivocation

Equivocation ("to call by the same name") is classified as both a formal and informal logical fallacy. It is the misleading use of a term with more than one meaning or sense (by glossing over which meaning is intended at a particular time). It generally occurs with polysemic words (words with multiple meanings).

The fallacy of equivocation is often used with words that have a strong emotional content and many meanings. These meanings often coincide within proper context, but the fallacious arguer does a semantic shift, slowly changing the context by treating, as equivalent, distinct meanings of the term.

On the one hand, you appear to be berating people for limiting themselves to biological evolution, and in the next post you will then reiterate 'descent with modification'. This notion does not apply to stellar evolution. Thus, your primary idea is really just equivocation - there's no significant relationship between these types of evolution over and above the fact that they all mean 'change over time'.

The stumbling block seems to be my use of the word 'descent'. If a biologist uses the word 'descent' it is taken to mean descent down through generations. It is an unspoken taken for granted fact that generations can only occur with the passage of/down through time. Knowledge the same, the universe the same down through time.

Paul.

Yes, this does appear to be your stumbling block as I've spelled out for you. In all the other types of evolution we can talk about, there is no descent because there are no generations. A rock that gets smashed by another is not the parent rock passing on its variability to its descendant shards. There are no generations, no descent, and no descent with modification.

Again, all you are really saying is that stuff changes over time - you're not establishing that the change is due to selection.