Zombies are the most popular mystical heroes in popular culture, along with vampires and werewolves. After watching films such as "Resident Evil", "Night of the Living Dead", "28 Days Later" and others, where a terrible kind of creature, who were once people, wander alone or in flocks, greedily devouring everything that moves, the people will - the involuntary begins to believe in their existence and awaits with horror the end of the world caused by the invasion of these creatures. But do zombies really exist?
Foolish but purposeful
First of all, let's define the very concept of "zombie". Now this is the name of the dead, revived in some fantastic way, and still living people, who, under some influence, have lost control over themselves and their bodies and limply obeying someone's orders. But it is obvious that these are two completely different categories, and it would not be worth them to be together in a "squad" of zombies. Let's try to separate the flies from the cutlets.
Horror stories about the dead, resurrected by the will of black sorcerers or evil gods, are abundant in the folklore of any nation. And the literary tradition is rich. For example, in the "Epic of Gilgamesh" (XVIII-XVII centuries BC) the goddess Ishtar promises:
I will pave the way into the depths filled,
I will raise the dead to devour the living. -
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Then there will be less living than dead!
In subsequent times, this misanthropic idea of a bloodthirsty goddess was developed in many books and films telling about the collapse of human civilization and the attempts of a small group of people to survive surrounded by aggressive zombies.
And, in fact, the modern archetype of zombies - unreasonable but purposeful resurrected cannibals, acting, as a rule, in large groups - in popular culture was largely defined by George Romero's film "Night of the Living Dead" (although the term "zombies" in it not used).
The worst thing is the eyes
But at the same time, there is a lot of documentary evidence about the living dead. Thus, in 1929, the New York Times reporter William Seabrook published the book The Island of Magic, in which he spoke about his life in Haiti, in the house of the famous witch Maman Seli.
This is how he describes his encounter with a zombie: “The worst thing is the eyes. And this is not my imagination at all. These were actually the eyes of a dead man, but not blind, but burning, defocused, unseeing. Therefore, the face was scary. So empty, as if there was nothing behind it. Not just a lack of expression, but a lack of ability to express. By this time, I had already seen so many things in Haiti that were outside of ordinary human experience that for a moment I completely turned off and thought, or rather, felt: "Great God, maybe all this nonsense is true?"
This photo is believed to be of Haitian Felicia Felix-Mentor, who died of a sudden illness in 1907. And in 1936 she was found: she wandered naked near her brother's farm. Both husband and brother recognized in her the one whom they themselves had buried almost thirty years ago.
The American writer Zora Hurston, who visited Haiti in 1938, wrote down from the islanders a story about the girl Mary, who died in 1909. Five years after her death, she was noticed in the window of a house in the capital of Haiti, Port-au-Prince, by former school friends. The owner of the house chased them away, flatly refusing to give any explanation.
Maria's father raised the entire surrounding population to their feet, they had to take up the police case. When they entered the house, neither the owner nor Mary was there. Meanwhile, rumors spread around the city, and in order to calm public opinion, the girl's grave was dug up. There was a skeleton in the coffin, too long for Maria. He was dressed in the clothes in which the girl was buried.
The islanders believed that the sorcerer dug up Maria and turned her into a zombie. And supposedly later, when he died, the widow gave the girl to a Catholic priest. And as if after that, her parents managed to take her from Haiti to France, disguised as a nun, and later her brother visited her there. Such a happy ending raises doubts about the veracity of this story.
More similar to the truth is another story that 3. Hurston heard from the mother of the deceased boy. On the night after the funeral, his sister suddenly heard singing and noise in the street. She recognized her brother's voice, and her crying woke the whole house. The family saw from the window an ominous procession of the dead and with them a boy buried the day before.
When he, with difficulty moving his legs, drew level with the window, everyone heard his plaintive cry. “But such is the horror inspired by these creatures, - writes 3. Hurston, - that even mother and sister did not dare to go out into the street and try to save him.” The procession disappeared from sight. After that, the boy's sister went crazy.
The magical power of telekinesis?
There is evidence of the resurrection from the dead by monks of Tibetan monasteries, Siberian shamans, sorcerers and healers of many other nations. But science completely denies this very possibility. For example, in the human brain, irreversible damage begins within four minutes after death. Although the zombie does not seem to need a brain - if only they move and sink their teeth into living flesh.
But this is the catch: within a few hours after death, most of the ATP (a nucleotide that plays an extremely important role in the metabolism of energy and substances in the body) in the muscles breaks down. And the provision of walking, assault and teeth-tricking requires constant feeding of the muscles with blood (even discarding the fact that the muscles must be controlled by the nervous system, which is the most unviable under conditions of hypoxia).
Since the corpse does not have blood circulation, respiration and other life-supporting processes, the muscles (which are viable for the first 10 hours after death) will not run anywhere.
So the sorcerer can force a corpse to walk and perform other body movements, no matter if it is fresh or half-rotten, or in general a skeleton only by the magical power of telekinesis. Only a very irrational expenditure of energy will turn out. It is much more effective and easier to hit the foe with this very force directly, without intermediaries in the form of zombies.
Secret potion
So, most likely, real zombies are not dead, but living people. Contrary to the many superstitions and legends surrounding the Haitian voodoo sorcerers - the bocor, their supernatural power is based on a completely prosaic foundation. They master the art of turning the intended victim into a zombie by sprinkling (or allowing to smell) some kind of medicine in her food.
According to some reports, such a potion is the nerve poison tetrodotoxin, extracted from the two-toothed fish. Under its influence, a person falls into a deep lethargy: breathing stops, the heartbeat slows down so much that the pulse is practically not felt, the eyes glaze - in short, all the signs of death, and sometimes even an experienced doctor cannot make a correct diagnosis.
The person is buried, and after a while the sorcerer retrieves him from the grave. With the help of another secret potion, he brings the "dead" to life, but not quite: the parts of the brain responsible for higher nervous activity remain blocked. A person turns into a zombie - a creature completely obedient to the will of the owner and capable of performing only the simplest tasks: eating, drinking, sleeping, working on a sugar plantation.
He walks slowly and uncertainly, he cannot speak articulately, he cannot orient himself in time and space. A zombie can stay in this state for quite a long time, but from time to time the sorcerer must feed him with his potion so that he does not wake up. And all the dances, spells and other rituals used when turning a victim into a zombie are for the entourage and support of authority.
Will the apocalypse begin?
But people can be made into zombies, and on a massive scale, using modern scientific methods. For example, create and launch a virus. In nature, there are abnormal infectious proteins called prions. They cause, for example, diseases such as mad cow disease. Prions that block some parts of the brain and leave others intact can also be created in the laboratory.
And if you attach them to a virus, at least the same flu, and launch them into the environment, then the zombie army is ready, and the apocalypse will begin on Earth.
You can also zombie people with psychotronic weapons. The media will play a fundamental role in this, using the "25th frame" and other similar devices.
At the call of the heart …
Look around - there are many zombies among us. These are not scary movie freaks, but quite respectable people, some of them wear suits, work in banks, drive cars and dress according to the latest fashion. But they do not have their own thoughts, opinions and are easily amenable to external influences.
These are people who watch false news on TV and fully believe it, read something on the Internet - and also immediately believe. They believe everything they are told. The head, mind, common sense of a zombie are in a permanent off state. 'Why think when there is TV, advertising, the Internet ?! The good uncle in the "zombie box" broadcasts how cool it is to have a new iPhone model, and they are already running to the store to buy this completely unnecessary gadget.
Such people, who do not know how to filter information, are an easy and desirable prey for those in power and political strategists who are in their service. It is worthwhile to build the process of fooling the population correctly, on the basis of modern scientific methods, and now the crowds of thousands of zombies "at the call of the heart" are going to kill innocent people. And this is really scary …
Valery NIKOLAEV