Living corpses
Mysterious somnambulists, reanimated dead, dumb slaves of local sorcerers are the hallmark of a small Caribbean island. And although the Criminal Code of Haiti says: “Any impact on a person that did not cause real death, but only a coma, should be regarded as attempted murder, more or less prolonged. If, after committing such actions, a person was buried, then the action is regarded as murder, regardless of the final result, - although zombie is illegal, there is a whole cult of zombies on the island to this day. Writers and filmmakers paid tribute to the mysterious phenomenon. They painted chilling scenes of violence, the terror of living corpses with glazed eyes. In fact, the situation is not so dire, but at the same time it is much more mysterious.
According to Haitian beliefs, people are zombified by sorcerers. As if at night the sorcerer sneaks up to the victim's house, presses his lips to the keyhole and … sucks out the soul of the future zombie. The soul is clogged in a bottle, and the person who has lost it soon dies. The sorcerer digs up his grave and pronounces the name of the deceased. In response, he raises his head, the sorcerer brings a slightly open bottle with a captive soul to his nose, a piece of the soul again infuses the body, and the corpse turns into a zombie. But this is superstition. In reality, the zombie happens differently.
In 1982, a scientific expedition to Haiti was led by Harvard University ethnobotanist Wade Davis. As a result of the research, it was discovered that local sorcerers know how to prepare poison that can cause deep lethargic sleep. A person who was planned to be turned into a zombie was imperceptibly placed in food or applied to the skin with a strong nerve poison of plant or animal origin, after which within 10-15 minutes his breathing, pulse, reflexes completely stopped - a real clinical death occurred. In this state, you can stay for several days and return to life.
Davis was able to meet with local sorcerers who prepared poisonous paralyzing powders and ointments. He was even allowed to be present during the witchcraft procedure and take samples for analysis.
So how is the living dead born into the light of God? According to the observations of researchers, the strongest and largest people are selected in advance for zombies, so that, after returning them to life, they can be used as obedient and weak-willed slaves in hard physical labor. After being poisoned with a potent drug, a person quickly "dies". He is buried, and after 12 hours (no more, otherwise the effect of the drug will cease and the buried alive will really die), supposedly by inspiration from above, the sorcerer orders his assistants to dig him out. Through special manipulations, a rite of revival takes place, and the former deceased begins a new life. He practically does not remember anything about himself, his own will and desires do not exist. The revived person turns into a submissive animal, becomes a slave. The living dead are treated like a leperand he finds himself in complete isolation among his compatriots.
There are external signs that allow local residents to accurately identify zombies: swaying when walking, mechanical and meaningless movements, unfocused meaningless gaze, a voice in the nose … These people can talk, can (and very well) work, but they have no memory, and in actions - no freedom, only obedience and learning. Some villagers with mystical horror recognize in the wordless workers on the plantations their relatives, who were buried many years ago.
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Obedience number one
Can the zombie phenomenon be rationally explained? Scientists have found that the main ingredient for the preparation of the death potion was the belly fish, or two-toothed fish. Its meat contains one of the most powerful nerve poisons in the world - tetradotoxin, which blocks sodium channels in the membranes of nerve and muscle cells. It can lead a person to a state very similar to clinical death. In people who have taken a sufficiently large dose, breathing weakens and general paralysis gradually sets in, but the person continues to live and even, oddly enough, remains fully conscious, only he cannot move. Other ingredients of zombie powder are: Borjia sea toad, polychaete stinging sea worm, shattered skull of a recently deceased witch called mambo in Haiti, mule or human gallbladder, child's skin and bones, black powder,talc and all kinds of herbs. All components are thoroughly ground and mixed for three days until a homogeneous yellowish powder is formed. Then the mixture is dipped for one day into the coffin of the same mambo, whose skull was included in the composition of the powder - supposedly the "magic power" emanating from the corpse soaks the drug and makes it ready for use.
Making zombie powder is very difficult. It is necessary to absolutely accurately determine the amount of tetradotoxin and other components in order to bring the victim to the required state, but not kill. But how can a person with an almost complete absence of breathing and heartbeat lie in the ground for several days and return to the world? The secret of bringing the buried person alive has been partially solved. The victim, dug from the grave, is given a revitalizing substance derived from a plant called a zombie cucumber. They also use specially prepared kallalu juice, which can immerse a person in a cataleptic trance. The “dead man” who has come to himself also receives a drug that causes hallucinations and memory loss. After a certain time, the zombie is completely ready - the person has turned into a submissive animal.
Yoga dungeons
The record holders in mastering the miracle of imaginary death are not African Negroes (ancestors of the Haitians) or the Indians of Central and South America. Perfection here is achieved by Indian yogis.
Here is what the Russian professor V. V. Brodov in his monograph "Indian Philosophy of the New Time": "The art of self-hypnosis and self-hypnosis in combination with physical exercises among yogis is so great that it can lead to phenomenal results. So, experienced yogis, suppressing some physiological functions of their body and activating others, can for a certain period bring themselves into a state similar to clinical death (almost complete absence of breathing and heartbeat), during which they seem to go into hibernation, which can be observed in animals in the winter."
In India, such a demonstration of the miraculous achievements of this discipline is popular, such as burying a yogi in the ground (and completely excluding the possibility of deception) and after several days extracting him from there completely healthy. Western explorer Pierce Gervis witnessed the spectacle when a yogi buried alive was underground for ten days and remained alive and well!
Scientists have recently proven that, in addition to wakefulness and sleep, there is a so-called third state. And, of course, the thought suggests itself that in zombies and yogis life in the third state is maintained precisely due to the activation of one of the most ancient mechanisms - the portal heart. No oxygen? But the portal heart does not need oxygen: smooth muscles can work for many hours. Energy reserves are sufficient.
An essentially similar procedure for turning a person into a zombie - here he was called a mankurt - existed in Central Asia. The legend about this is mentioned by Chingiz Aitmatov in the novel "Storm Stop": "Mankurt did not know who he was, what kind of tribe, did not know his name, did not remember his childhood, father and mother - in a word, mankurt did not realize that he was human creature. He was equivalent to a dumb creature and therefore absolutely submissive and safe."
Everyone knows from childhood fairy tales about people who were bewitched, turned into animals, put into sleep, that is, in one way or another they subdued and made evil sorcerers controllable. Let us recall at least Andersen's "The Snow Queen" …
Psychiatrist hit the brains
The fact that the psyche of people can be influenced was understood in ancient times. Conspiracies, spells, damage, evil eye came to us from paganism. Now we perceive this as a manifestation of bioenergetic influences.
The same can be said for zombies. African black sorcerers have long practiced subjugating individuals to their will with the help of narcotic substances, poisonous potions, combined with special methods of psychological influence.
Asia did not lag behind. Marco Polo mentioned a certain "old man Alaodin", who created an army of ideally controlled assassins and kept all the surrounding settlements in fear. Indeed, there was a secret sect of assassins, where they created their own warriors, mankurt. And his followers, successors and successors still live.
Over the past decades, the military vocabulary has been replenished with another term - psychotronic war, that is, the effect on the brain by directed radiation. This is worse than a zombie.
The US Central Intelligence Agency has developed top-secret programs codenamed "Blue Bird", "Artichoke", "MK-Ultra", designed to exert psychophysical effects on the human brain. For research of this type, American intelligence agents attracted specialists in occult sciences, they studied the works of the Holy Inquisition of the Middle Ages, the practice of Nazi psychiatrists in concentration camps, the effects of LSD, marijuana and other drugs, electroshock, potent sleeping pills, etc.
In the fifties, the president of the World Psychiatric Association, Dr. Even Cameron, under orders from the CIA, conducted secret experiments to manipulate the human brain on two hundred unwitting "experimental rabbits", which were exposed to electric shock, LSD and sensory isolation. Of these two hundred victims, by 1979 only nine remained, who retained their sane mind and decided to file a complaint against their torturer.
The trial, which lasted almost ten years, found Cameron's actions absurd, dangerous, unscientific and immoral. After a hard-hitting, dramatic and downright stunning lawsuit, nine Canadians received $ 750,000 in damages from the CIA. At the time, stories about the CIA and Dr. Cameron were on the front pages of newspapers. Head over heels, "the leaders in white coats" tried to destroy all the research documents. Is that all?
It turned out that in one of the academic Moscow institutes, similar work was also carried out - but on animals …
So the monstrous medieval customs of mankind dragged into the third millennium.
F. Kuimov