It is within the very words themselves. Anima. Animated. Once inanimate, sterile matter now set to action. It is your job to tame it. Such grotesque displays of primordial consumptions cease once a civilization has fully conquered its planet and transformed it into a utopia. But beware that you do not tame yourselves into such unnatural disability. A species that masters its environment and domesticates every inferior within its domain must carefully maintain its military might so that it does not collapse.
More directly: the fox could be chewing some non sentient vegetation for nutrients if you truly wished, but your childrens children should remain wary that this is the innate default truth of reality, and that only intelligent benevolent power forces it to be otherwise.
