One friend in particular reached out to express his shock that I was (at least rhetorically) siding with young earth creationists against Christians who believe in an old universe. I replied that I didn’t even know what he was talking about! He pointed to the article. I cocked my head. Why would anyone think that? I asked. At which point he reminded me of the creationist debate among evangelicals and, against that backdrop, explained why a title and argument like mine would look and feel a certain way even if its substance wasn’t about that at all.
People absorbed in a certain Discourse always find it difficult to realize that many others neither know nor care about that Discourse’s disputes; everything gets put through the filter of their own obsessions. I can’t tell you how often people have written to me assuming that some post of mine is a covert commentary on some argument they’e invested in, and simply don’t believe me when I tell them that I’ve never heard of, or anyway have never thought about, that controversy.