Scientists have been studying the causes of cannibalism for a long time. Researchers recently discovered how mental illness, in extreme and rare cases, can lead a person to violate this severe prohibition.
Specialists recently reviewed 5 medical case studies of male patients between 18 and 36 years old. By examining their stories and details of their diagnoses, the experts hoped to discover behavioral patterns that explain what caused the cannibalistic acts. In humans, evidence of cannibalism goes back to ancestors who lived 900 thousand years ago. This phenomenon was recorded in Neanderthals about 100 thousand years ago.
Traces have been preserved in bones over 17 thousand years old. The practice has survived in some human societies associated with social practices and rituals. Similar phenomena were documented in poor areas of North Korea in 2013 amid severe hunger.
However, at the same time, pathological cannibalism is extremely rare and it is believed that it can occur in 2 types of people: those who experience extreme forms of significant paraphilia, and those who suffer from severe mental illness. The researchers wrote that since only 5 cases were considered for the study, and all subjects were men, the data obtained are not intended to be widely applied to other cases of cannibalism.
Each case is also clinically complex and therefore requires further analysis to unravel the web of individual and environmental factors that can lead to cannibalism. Maksim Golichenkov, candidate of biological sciences, lecturer at Moscow State University, expressed his opinion on the fact of human cannibalism: “The history of cannibalism in people, on the one hand, is a psychiatric problem, and on the other, it is stressful as a problem of fasting, with the third, in my opinion, the most interesting, - an anthropological reason, rooted in the early religious concepts of man.
Such phenomena as eating enemies, relatives and complex rituals of sacrifice. However, this is a question for anthropologists and ethnographers, but it is possible that banal socio-biological reasons could trigger the emergence of such rituals. Relatively recently, Pakistan was sentenced in an unusual case. For the first time in the history of the country, the defendants were convicted of cannibalism. 2 brothers, Farman Ali and Muhammad Arif, received 12 years in prison.
Moreover, the men were tried under the article "Terrorism", as their actions horrified society. In Pakistani legislation, in fact, there is simply no article under which such an act would fall. The criminal case against Ali and Arif was opened after it turned out that in April 2011 they dug up the corpse of a baby from the grave and ate it. The investigation established that the brothers feasted on carrion earlier.
In total, they were found to have dug over 100 graves at the local cemetery before neighbors suspected that something was wrong. As established by the doctors, both brothers previously suffered from mental illness.
Promotional video: