Is Evolution a Frog-to-Prince Fairytale Fit Only for Nursery Children?
Given that most people do not have advanced degrees in mathematics or the sciences, debates and discussions surrounding evolution and creationism appear in the public square in the form of competing metaphors, similes, and extended analogies. In other words, we use metaphors, similes, and extended analogies to simplify and grasp issues that might be otherwise inaccessible to us. Hence we can keep a look-out for the ways in which our use of language, especially metaphorical language, frames and structures discussions of evolution and creationism. Today’s metaphor comes from a young earth creationist book—perhaps the most famous of these types of books ever made—Duane Gish’s Evolution: The Fossils Say No!—in which evolution is likened to a nursery story. In Evolution: The Fossils Say No!, which was first published in 1972, Gish equates evolution belief to a child’s naive belief in the fairy tale of the “Frog Prince” (p. 17): While evolutionists deny the miraculous in the origin of living
