Elyse Friedman

Is Chance the Real Mother of Invention?

This 59-second video of wild foxes stumbling onto someone’s backyard trampoline says a lot to me about how humans likely developed and progressed.

Two animals, in what appears to be a pre-mating play-fight, have jumped onto a trampoline. This bit of happenstance leads to an unforeseen result: intense springiness.

Notice how one of the foxes, I’ll call it Fox 2, is immediately intrigued and distracted by this new and unexpected feeling. ”What the hell,” Fox 2 seems to be thinking, as he separates from Fox 1 in order to explore the bouncy surface. He jumps up and down repeatedly, testing it out, feeling it. Fox 1 (who clearly has no imagination) doesn’t give a damn, and tries to resume the mating ritual, but Fox 2 is no longer into it. They separate.

Fox 1 goes to one side of the trampoline and sits—facing in, waiting patiently for Fox 2 to come around. Fox 2 wanders to the opposite side of the trampoline, facing out—he gazes into the distance, appears contemplative. I venture that this new experience has left him a changed fox. The wiring has been altered. A previously dormant part of the brain is twitching and lighting up. He turns, glances momentarily at Fox 1, then looks away and resumes examining his new discovery.

- Elyse Friedman

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4 Comments

  • Facebook User
    September 9, 2009 10:58 am | Permalink

    At first both foxes seem interested but fox one is quickly distracted or more interested in playing. I also noticed that fox two seems to believe that the bounciness is located in one particular part of the trampoline, he returns to the upper portion of the trampoline to experiment with jumping.

  • mELI
    September 9, 2009 8:50 pm | Permalink

    Man vs. Nature a disturbing imbalance

  • Shari Lapeña
    September 10, 2009 9:25 am | Permalink

    Very interesting!
    My guess is that Fox 1 is the male.

    • September 11, 2009 3:08 am | Permalink

      Then they’re both males, as Fox 2’s jumping genitals testify.

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Elyse Friedman

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Elyse Friedman is the author most recently of “Long Story Short, a Novella & Stories” (Anansi). She has written two novels, “Then Again” (Random House Canada) and “Waking Beauty” (Crown US), and the poetry collection, “Know Your Monkey” (ECW). For more Elyse Friedman, go here.