Categories: Comparisons, Pseudo-explanations
An example of metaphor in popular science writing:
"To get the raw materials for life, we need to start with basic constituents like carbon and hydrogen and turn them into progressively more complex molecules. But you can't do that if there's plenty of oxygen around, because it jumps onto the hydrogen to make water (H2O), and onto the carbon to make carbon dioxide (CO2), and everything stops there"
Andrew May
May, A. (2019) Astrobiology. The Search for Life Elsewhere in the Universe
This metaphor seems a little anthropomorphic to me, as 'jumping' seems to imply some kind of deliberate, as we as enthusiastic, act?
Read examples of anthropomorphism in science
Tags: chemical reactions, oxygen
[Please be aware that a word may have different nuances, or even a different meaning, according to context.]« Back to Index
