Characteristics. Both Ahab and Ishmael are fascinated by the whale, but whereas Ahab perceives him exclusively as evil, Ishmael keeps an open mind. Ahab has a static world view, blind to new information, but Ishmael's world view is constantly in flux as new insights and realizations occur.
This sentence utilizes a simile because it is comparing two things with the word “like” which is a common indicator for a simile rather than a metaphor.
