I would answer "YES" without any doubt (at least to the points b) and c);
as Alexei pointed out, what the unit is can be ambiguous). For me the only
difference between traditional "Darwinian" evolution and
"self-organization" is that in the former the source of selection is
external (the system's environment) and in the second case internal (the
system's dynamics and components).
Since, as every systems theorist knows, what is is system and what is
environment is decided by the observer, there is no strict separation
possible between "Darwinian" and "self-organizing" evolution. External
selection by the environment becomes internal "self-organization" when you
shift your point of view from an individual organism to an ecosystem.
Similarly, the "self-organization" of different tissues during
morphogenetic development becomes adaptation to an external environment of
others cells when you look at it from the point of view of a single cell.
I have discussed this point in several of my papers (e.g. the one on
Complexity Growth). It is also discussed at length in a number of recent
papers by Mark Bickhard (http://www.lehigh.edu/~mhb0/mhb0.html) (where he
even extends the selectionist interpretation to quantum field theory).
Another source which makes more or less the same point is Ashby's classic
paper, one of the first on self-organization:
Ashby W.R. (1962): "Principles of the Self-Organizing System", in:
Principles of Self-Organization, von Foerster H. & Zopf G.(eds.),
(Pergamon, Oxford), p. 255-278.
>Am I merely streaching the term "evolutionary" to much?
Depends on how you want to use the term "evolution", which is very vague. A
more precise terminology, used by people such as Bickhard, Donald T.
Campbell and Gary Cziko, is to call both processes "selectionist". This
merely implies that it can be understood as the result of variation and
selection, where the selection is "natural" in the sense that it happens
spontaneously, automatically, without conscious agent, but not in the more
traditional sense (neo)-Darwinian sense that it requires an external
environment. Pure "blindness" of variation is not strictly necessary, since
variation can be guided by previously acquired experience, although it is
understood to have played a fundamental role at some stage in the process.
_________________________________________________________________________
Francis Heylighen <fheyligh@vub.ac.be> -- Center "Leo Apostel"
Free University of Brussels, Krijgskundestr. 33, 1160 Brussels, Belgium
tel +32-2-6442677; fax +32-2-6440744; http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HEYL.html