It's that age-old question we all seek the answer to:

Any Philosphy 101 Professor

Why not?

Aristotle

It is the essence of squirrels to jump the electrical-pole transformer. To actualize its potential.

Ayn Rand

It was jumping the electrical-pole transformer because of its own rational choice to do so. There cannot be a collective unconscious; desires are unique to each individual.

Baldrick

It had a cunning plan.

Basil Fawlty

Oh, don't mind that squirrel. It's from Barcelona.

Alastair Cooke

Good Evening, and welcome to Masterpiece Theatre.Tonight, we present the epic British drama "How The Squirrel Went," based on the 1843 novel by Herbert T. Rodentia, and adapted for the screen by Joanna Pecan-Smythe. Starring Susan Hampshire as the Squirrel, and Anthony Hopkins as the evil and unrepentant hunter, Borstrom, this elegant period piece explores the mores and morality of a society in which ordinary squirrels had to face their destiny of jumping the electrical-pole transformer to meet their fate at the hands of the monied upper classes, regardless of their own ambitions or desires...

Albert Einstein

Whether the squirrel jumped the electrical-pole transformer or the electrical-pole transformer jumped the squirrel depends upon the frame of reference of the observer.

Anthony Trollope

Why, to avoid Mrs. Proudy and Mr. Slope, of course.

Ben Bova

To be reunited with beautiful grey-eyed Athena, the woman he has loved for all of time.

Bill Gates

For the money.

Bob Dylan

How many electrical-pole transformers must one squirrel jump?

Bones

Dammit, I'm a doctor, not a zoologist!

Buddha

To ask this question denies your own squirrel nature.

B.F. Skinner

Because the external influences which had pervaded its sensorium from birth had caused it to develop in such a fashion that it would tend to jump electrical-pole transformers, even while believing these actions to be of its own free will.

B'Elanna

I'm sure it felt suffocated by all the bleeping regulations of bleeping Starfleet and just couldn't stand it any longer!

Julius Caesar

It came, it saw, it jumped.

Camille Paglia

It was drawn by the subconscious chthonian power of the feminine which men can never understand, to jump the electrical-pole transformer and focus itself on its task. Female squirrels are not capable of doing this-their minds do not work that way. Feminism tries vainly to pretend there is no real difference between them, falsely following Rousseau. But de Sade has proved....

Kirk

To boldly go where no squirrel has gone before.

Picard

To see what's out there.

Carl Jung

The confluence of events in the cultural gestalt necessitated that individual squirrels jump electrical-pole transformers at this historical juncture, and therefore synchronicitously brought such occurrences into being.

Chakotay

Whatever its reason, whatever its goals, we should respect its right to jump the electrical-pole transformer and seek its own spiritual awareness.

Colonel Kilgore

I love the smell of squirrels in the morning.

Saunders

It Ran, Suh! I offered it a coating of 11 herbs and spices and it ran, Suh! So I shot it, Suh, shot it while it was trying to escape, suh!

Noam Chomsky

To manufacture consent

Commander Data

I do not know. Although I have compared all of my 437 billion data points relating to squirrels and electrical-pole transformers, there is no positive correlation between the two.

Confucius

When the emperor performs the rites with full reverence, and the court officers behave as true scholars and gentlemen, a squirrel may jump any electrical-pole transformer in the kingdom safely.

Darth Vader

Because it could not resist the power of the Dark Side.

David Hume

Out of custom and habit.

Dax

To get to the other side. Kurzon might have disagreed with me, Tobin I'm sure wouldn't have had a clue, and then there's...

Dorothy Parker

Travel, trouble, music, art / A kiss, a frock, a rhyme / The squirrel never said they fed its heart / But still they pass its time.

Doug Hofstadter

To seek explication of the correspondence between appearance and essence through the mapping of the external electrical-pole transformer-object onto the internal electrical-pole transformer-concept.

Douglas Adams

Forty-Two

Crusher

If there's nothing wrong with the squirrel, there must be something wrong with the universe.

Jack Van Impe

Well you see, here's the really exciting part, if we were to look at Revelation 17:3 we will see that the Whore of Babylon rides on a scarlet beast. A scarlet beast! What this means is a Rhode Island Red. And the truly glorious thing is that this beast, this Rhode Island Red, this Squirrel has jumped the electrical-pole transformer EXACTLY as was prophesized in the Bible and this is all a sign, Revelation 17:3, that we're living in the End Time. Hallelujah! And if you would like more information on the significance of this squirrel jumping the electrical-pole transformer as all part of God's great plan then send me $50 and you will recieve this set of video tapes along with a copy of my recent book "Squirrels: rodent or rabid beast?".

Strangelove

Because it could not afford to be caught on the wrong side of the electrical-pole transformer-side gap.

Dylan Thomas

To not go gentle into that good night.

Emily Dickinson

Because it could not stop for death.

Epicurus

For fun.

Ernest Hemingway

To die. In the rain.

E.E. (Doc) Smith

Your humble narrator can barely do justice to this climactic event that rent asunder the fundamental ether of space itself, as the squirrel, embodying all that is good and hard and straight and keen in the rodent world, fearlessly approached, bridged, and conquered the electrical-pole transformer for Civilization.

Foghorn Leghorn

To get to that damn Dawg, Boah!

Franz Kafka

Deiter, now in the form of a squirrel, was running from the government's torture machine. The machine, an instrument of death, slowly obliterated the souls of its victims. Deiter was alone. He was running for his life, his insignificant life.

Friederich Nietzsche

There was no squirrel, no electrical-pole transformer, no jumping. There was only an interpretation.

Gandalf

O squirrel, do not meddle in the affairs of electrical-pole transformers, for you are tasty and good with barbecue sauce.

Gary Gygax

Because I rolled a 64 on the "Squirrel Random Behaviors" chart on page 497 of the Dungeon Master's Guide.

George Lucas

Because the Force was with it.

George Orwell

Because Big Brother was watching to make sure that it did jump the electrical-pole transformer, although in its heart, the squirrel never did.

Geraldo Rivera

Stay tuned as a panel of squirrels reveals the shocking truth.

Gilligan

The traffic started getting rough; the squirrel had to jump. If not for the plumage of its peerless tail the squirrel would be lost. The squirrel would be lost!

Gloria Steinem

She was a victim of the male conspiracy.

Gottfried Von Leibniz

In this best possible world, the electrical-pole transformer was made for it to jump.

Groucho Marx

This morning I shot a squirrel in my pyjamas --and lemme tell ya, that squirrel ran out of my pyjamas in a second!

Gul Dukat

Well, that's a very interesting question...I'm sure we can work out some kind of arrangement to obtain that information that will be to everyone's satisfaction.

Hamlet

Because 'tis better to suffer in the mind the slings and arrows of outrageous electrical-pole transformer maintenance than to take arms against a sea of oncoming vehicles.

Hunter S. Thompson

Why the &*%$#@ not?

H.P. Lovecraft

To futilely attempt escape from the dark powers which even then pursued it, hungering after the stuff of its soul!

Immanuel Kant

Because it was a duty.

Jack Nicholson

Because it <bleep>-ing wanted to. That's the <bleep>-ing reason.

Jacques Derrida

The question admits of limitless answers, since there is no one logocentric strategy of discourse that takes primacy over all others. How do we get the idea of the squirrel in the first place? Does it exist outside of language?

James Joyce

To forge in the smithy of its soul the uncreated conscience of its race.

Jane Austen

Because it is a truth universally acknowledged that a single squirrel, being posessed of a good fortune and presented with a good electrical-pole transformer, must be desirous of jumping.

Janeway

Its primary goal was no doubt to get back to the Alpha Quadrant...and it probably misses its dog.

Dr. Suess

Across the pole I will not scram / Even though a rodent I am. Please dear squirrel give it a try / For across the pole you can not fly. / Alright! Alright! I'll give it a try / For it is true, squirrels can't fly. / Hey! It's not bad, infact it's droll! / I truly love to jump the pole. / Across the pole I LOVE to scram. / I jump the pole, a rodent I am.

Sartre

To impose a meaning upon her accidental existence.

JFK

The squirrel chose to jump the electrical-pole transformer in this decade not because it was easy, but because it was hard.

Jim Gillis

The squirrel jumped the electrical-pole transformer to show the gophers it could be done.

Johann Friedrich von Goethe

The eternal squirrel-principle made it do it.

John Cleese

Because it was very silly.

John Constantine

Because it'd made a bollocks of things over on this side of the electrical-pole transformer and figured it'd better get out right quick.

John Le Carre

Because it knew, at the core of its being where none could ever reach, that its only course of action now that its cover was blown wide open was to try and slip away into the grey, foggy, bleak evening before Smiley came, accompanied by his silent shadow Peter Guillam, asking questions for which there could never be answers.

John Milton

To justify the ways of God to men.

Jerry Seinfeld

Squirrel? What's up with that? I had an uncle who thought he was a squirrel. My aunt almost divorced him, but we needed the nuts.

John Steinbeck

The electrical-pole transformer baked in the relentless summer sun as the squirrel, looking about, began to jump. It stopped ocassionally to peck at a grass seed that had become lodged in a crevice in the cracked macadam. The squirrel reached the other side, then began making his way to the Salinas, which lay muddy and turgid in the July afternoon, all the while thinking of the cool shade by the river and how good the can of beans in his bedroll would taste tonight.

John Sununu

The Air Force was only too happy to provide the transportation, so quite understandably the squirrel availed himself of the opportunity.

Joseph Campbell

In primitive cultures, we can find many such examples of the squirrel motif that cannot be dismissed as mere coincidence. For instance, I am reminded of an old Navajo legend in which a buffalo jumps a stream to "come" to the other side --an obvious negative language devised to prepare tribesmen for a transcendental experience. Similarly, the Hindus believe in savanaya, or a sacred cow that leaps over a chasm on Thursdays. Through metaphorical interpretation, we are led to realize that all examples suggest an attainable higher state of consciousness like that of Nietzsche's ubermench, or superman, as outlined in his novel "Thus Spoke Zarathustra."

Joseph Stalin

It was clearly a conspiracy. Take all the squirrels out and shoot them. At Once!

s

Karl Marx

To escape the bourgeois middle-class struggle.

Khan

With my last breath I spit at the squirrel...

Kira

It was probably being chased by those cursed Cardassians.

Lao Tse

Those who chitter do not know. Those who know do not chitter.

Leda

Are you sure it wasn't Zeus dressed up as a squirrel? He's into that kind of thing, you know.

Lee Iacocca

It found a better car, which was on the other side of the electrical-pole transformer.

Lucien Bouchard

So that it could be SEPARATE!

Ludwig Wittgenstein

The possibility of "jumping" was encoded into the objects "squirrel" and "electrical-pole transformer", and circumstances came into being which caused the actualization of this potential occurrence.

Lyndon LaRouche

She was a victim of the English Gnostic Drug Cartel conspiracy.

Machiavelli

So that its subjects will view it with admiration, as a squirrel which has the daring and courage to boldly jump the electrical-pole transformer, but also with fear, for whom among them has the strength to contend with such a paragon of rodent virtue? In such a manner is the princely squirrel's dominion maintained.

Mae West

I invited it to come up and see me sometime.

Yoda

Jumping the electrical-pole transformer does not make a squirrel great.

Margaret Thatcher

There was no alternative.

Mark Twain

The news of its jumping has been greatly exaggerated.

Marshall McLuhan

The Electrical-pole transformer is the Medium. The squirrel is the Message!

Martin Gardner.

This squirrel story seems merely more gaga New Age silliness at first, but may contain something more sinister. No reputable scientist has ever reported a squirrel jumping a electrical-pole transformer. Alleged "close encounters" with such squirrels are claimed by ignorant and suggestible people only. One recalls similar mass delusions in Nazi Germany before Hitler.

Martin Luther King

It had a dream.

Michael Palin

Nobody expects the banished inky squirrel!

Monty Python

For Something Completely Different

Moses

Know ye that it is unclean to eat the squirrel that has jumped the electrical-pole transformer, and that the squirrel that jumpeth the electrical-pole transformer doth so for its own preservation.

Mr. Spock

It was not logical for the squirrel to do so, but I have frequently observed that the behaviour of squirrels is not logical

Mr. T

If you saw me coming you'd jump the electrical-pole transformer too!

Mr. Worf

I do not know, Klingon squirrels do NOT jump electrical-pole transformers.

Neelix

Actually, Captain, I'm not really familiar with the squirrels in this system. But, if you can catch it, I can cook it.

Newt Gingrich

The squirrel choose to exercize individual initiative and not wait for a government-funded street-light program.

Nietzsche

Because if you gaze too long at the Electrical-pole transformer, the Electrical-pole transformer gazes also at you.

Oliver North

National Security was at stake. ... And it was ONLY following executive orders.

Oscar Wilde

This squirrel problem has many depths, but all of them are equally shallow.

Pat Robertson

She was a victim of the Illuminati One World conspiracy.

Plato

For the greater good.

Q

Wouldn't you like to know? Too bad your puny human brain wouldn't be able to comprehend the answer.

Ralph Klein

Because I cut $470 million from its budget, that's why.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

It didn't jump the electrical-pole transformer; it transcended it.

Raymond Chandler

She had beady inhuman eyes like strange black jewels and the kind of fur a mink might envy. I knew that if they gave her an acorn she'd take off and never look back.

Rene Descartes

It had sufficient reason to believe it was dreaming anyway.

Richard Nixon

That part of our conversation was accidentally erased.

Robert Anton Wilson

Because agents of the Ancient Illuminated Rodents of Quercus were controlling it with their Orbital Mind-Control Lasers as part of their master plan to take over the world's acorn production.

Robert Burns

Fair Fa Your Honest Sonsie Face Great Chieftain O' The Squirrel Race The blackened electrical-pole transformer 'ahind ye said Ye best run quick ere ye be deid!

Robert Frost

To jump the electrical-pole transformer less traveled by.

Robert Heinlein

Because with the freedom the squirrel was given, it was the squirrel's responsibility to do so.

Roland Barthes

The squirrel wanted to expose the myth of the electrical-pole transformer.

Rush Limbaugh

She was brainwashed by the liberal feminazi media.

Saddam Hussein

This was an unprovoked act of rebellion and we were quite justified in dropping 50 tons of nerve gas on it.

Sarek

Sometimes logic fails me where squirrels are concerned.

Scotty

Because she couldna take much morrrrrre.

Sherlock Holmes

It was not merely that the squirrel jumped the electrical-pole transformer, Watson, but that the three Russian midgets and the Italian oboe player did not also jump.

Sigmund Freud

The squirrel obviously was female and obviously interpreted the pole as a phallic symbol of which she was envious. Like all female creatures she wanted to be dominated.

Sir Edmund Hilary

Because it's there.

Sir Isaac Newton

Squirrels at rest tend to stay at rest. Squirrels in motion tend to jump the electrical-pole transformer.

The Borg

Jumping the electrical-pole transformer is irrelevant. The squirrel will be assimilated.

The Grand Nagus

Stupid squirrel! You don't jump the electrical-pole transformer all at once! You sneak up to it quietly, without anyone noticing!

The Sphinx

You tell me.

Thomas de Torquemada

Give me ten minutes with the squirrel and I'll find out.

Thomas Dequincy

Because it ran out of opium.

Thomas Jefferson

All squirrels are endowed by Nature and Nature's God with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of the other side.

Timothy Leary

Because that's the only kind of trip the Establishment would let it take.

Tom Clancy

The Mark 84 gargleblaster that the squirrel carried, at the heart of which was an inferior ex-Soviet excimer laser system, had insufficient range to allow the squirrel to carry out its mission from this side of the electrical-pole transformer.

Oral Roberts

He couldn't raise the $100,000 so God called him to the other side.

Uhura

Shall I open hailing frequencies so you can ask it, sir?

Vito Corleone

We made her an offer she couldn't refuse.