Darwin Squirrel

Continuing with the commemoration of The Origin of Species, we see below some of the counter-intuitive results that can arise from the idea of natural selection: how else can we explain a parent risking her life for a child? As humans, we tend to say "love." We also tend to say that all those primitive other things that happen to live on our planet don't experience such noble refined emotions. Nevertheless, from an evolutionary perspective, it makes sense that an organism that puts a great deal of time and effort (resources) into reproducing would be protective of her offspring.
In the picture above, a bebe squirrel (awwww....) has just fallen off a tree, and an evil puppeh (Oh Noes!) has pounced. And below we see the inevitable outcome in our moral tale of cute versus evil. (You can click over to The Mail Online to read the full story and see the intervening pictures between the scary beginning and happy ending)
Of course, it isn't inevitable, and it's not a moral tale. It's life. And it makes an awful lot of sense from an evolutionary perspective. Not much sense at all from a moral perspective. Which would you prefer, from your own perspective: a live squirrel, or a starving dog?

Personally, I'd rather not have to choose. But life doesn't have the choice of not choosing.

To pull another quote from this wise man,

I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidae with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of caterpillars or that a cat should play with mice... On the other hand, I cannot anyhow be contented to view this wonderful universe, and especially the nature of man, and to conclude that everything is the result of brute force. I am inclined to look at everything as resulting from designed laws, with the details, whether good or bad, left to the working out of what we may call chance.

Life can be cruel, but after all, it's life. What more do you want?