By Bev Davis
Register-Herald senior editor
May 02, 2008 09:15 pm
—
It happens at least once a week. My cat Grace is curled in my lap, and I’m absorbed in a good book. The house is totally quiet.
Suddenly, without warning or provocation, my bunny CJ jumps up as if he’s been hit by a bolt of lightning and takes off in a dead run. He hits the hallway full speed, zigzags his way to the kitchen, runs a couple of laps around the table, zigzags back through the house and circles the family room several times before collapsing.
While CJ lies there on the rug, his sides heaving from all the exertion, the cat and I look at each other, totally puzzled. This is a bunny bred in captivity who’s never been out in the wild a day in his life.
Who knows why he periodically goes through this little survival ritual? Grace and I suspect we may have a phantom greyhound who gets loose periodically and gives the rabbit a good run for his money.
What really intrigues me is the zigzag maneuvers the bunny uses in his imaginary escape plan. Self-defense experts tell humans to use that pattern when trying to escape from a gunman, noting it’s likely even a good shooter would hit a moving target only four out of 100 times. Even then, they say, the bullet would not likely strike a vital organ.
So who tells the bunnies? Dyed-in-the-wool scientists can argue it’s mere instinct. But who gave them that instinct? Who tells mama cats to consume the placentas of their young so they won’t have to leave their young to go hunt for food for a few days?
Who tells a lizard to freeze in place, blending so well he looks like nothing more than a bump on the wood? Reptiles, I’m told, have the most primitive brain, but they have survival instincts.
Every species comes with a set of unique instincts programmed into its specific survival plan.
Random selection? I don’t have enough faith to believe that.
This weekend, I plan to see the movie “Expelled,” which I’m told makes a great argument for Intelligent Design. I don’t need to be convinced, mind you. This time of year, the emergence of new life around me overwhelms me with the sheer wonder of it all.
Call me simple, but I can’t believe all the billions of details that make bunnies bunnies and humans humans and cats cats happened randomly.
I make no apologies for believing in creation by a loving God who made so many wonderful things for us to use and enjoy. I don’t know how He did it all, but I see incredible design and intricate detail in everything around me. I do have enough faith to believe that.
As for that phantom greyhound, well, I’ll admit he’s a little hard to explain. Maybe the same Person who teaches bunnies how to run for their lives tells phantom greyhounds when it’s time to show up and give them some practice.
— E-mail: bdavis@register-herald.com
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