neuropathy progresses, it results in reduced, or altered, sensation in the arms and legs. This is different from no feeling at all. If left untreated patients could eventually lose sensation altogether and be rendered unable to walk and confined to a wheelchair.
Though a zombie set on fire may not react to bodily injury, the fact remains that physical sensation must be present for it tograb, clutch, claw, tackle, chase, chew, bite, and effectively hunt the living. However, it is reasonable to suggest that zombies may not feel pain.
People with a rare nervous system disorder known as congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis (CIPA) have no ability to sense pain, but they are able to feel pressure. Therefore, CIPA patients can navigate the world just as any other person does—they walk, run, play—but in doing so, they risk serious injury to themselves without even knowing.
CIPA sufferers often experience burns, broken limbs, and other self-inflicted wounds because their defensive reflex is largely shut off. Even though they can feel a knife going through their hand, it doesn’t hurt, so why avoid it?
In humans, CIPA can prove to be an extremely damaging condition. Teething infants chew their tongues and lips to bloody shreds. Toddlers play too rough and hurt themselves and others. Teens act even more recklessly than their peers, and the problems often get worse with age. By contrast, in a zombie, this same trait would allow them to go to any length to accomplish their morbid objective.
Dead Set
(2008)
VERONICA:
Just make sure you pin his head down and cover his teeth.
JOPLIN:
What if he gets loose?
VERONICA:
Do it right and he won’t.
JOPLIN:
Yes, but what if he does?
VERONICA:
Then he’ll probably kill us!
WHAT DO ZOMBIES SEE?
Though it seems likely that zombies have at least diminished pain receptors, a clearer understanding of how visual information is processed by the brain may shed some light on their lack of involuntary responses, such as flinching and ducking. To that end, Rita Carter’s work
The Human Brain Book
proves an invaluable resource. Carter explains that there are actually two types of vision present in humans:
Conscious vision is the familiar process of seeing and recognizing something, while unconscious vision uses information from the eyes to guide behavior without our knowledge of it happening. 20
Put another way, our conscious sight allows us to recognize the undead mailman as a zombie coming to eat us, and our unconscious sight helps us avoid the falling tree branch we didn’t even realize we saw in the split second it comes crashing down.
Therefore, a lack of defensive posturing in the undead may be explained by a failure in its unconscious vision. Regardless of whether it can feel pain, understand a threat, or even desire to avoid physical damage, that zombie at your front door simply might not be able to see the bat in your hand before you connect with the side of its skull. This may especially be true if zombies’ reaction times are greatly slowed, as is often theorized.
THE BEST DEFENSE IS A GOOD OFFENSE
Findings out of Italy suggest that the undead’s lack of defensive behavior may have more to do with their hardwired strategy of coping with the threat they face than with their visual abilities.
In August 2010, researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory discovered a switch in the human brain that controls fear, identifying the specific type of neuron that determines how animals react to frightening stimuli. When the switch is “up,” a passive, fear-based response is triggered. When the switch is “down,” aggression takes hold.
Study leader Cornelius Gross clarified the results, explaining that they were not blocking the actual fear but just changing the animals’ responses to that fear. So in the case of zombies, their complete lack of defense, even when experiencing severe bodily injury, could simply mean that their fear switch is locked in the down
Though a zombie set on fire may not react to bodily injury, the fact remains that physical sensation must be present for it tograb, clutch, claw, tackle, chase, chew, bite, and effectively hunt the living. However, it is reasonable to suggest that zombies may not feel pain.
People with a rare nervous system disorder known as congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis (CIPA) have no ability to sense pain, but they are able to feel pressure. Therefore, CIPA patients can navigate the world just as any other person does—they walk, run, play—but in doing so, they risk serious injury to themselves without even knowing.
CIPA sufferers often experience burns, broken limbs, and other self-inflicted wounds because their defensive reflex is largely shut off. Even though they can feel a knife going through their hand, it doesn’t hurt, so why avoid it?
In humans, CIPA can prove to be an extremely damaging condition. Teething infants chew their tongues and lips to bloody shreds. Toddlers play too rough and hurt themselves and others. Teens act even more recklessly than their peers, and the problems often get worse with age. By contrast, in a zombie, this same trait would allow them to go to any length to accomplish their morbid objective.
Dead Set
(2008)
VERONICA:
Just make sure you pin his head down and cover his teeth.
JOPLIN:
What if he gets loose?
VERONICA:
Do it right and he won’t.
JOPLIN:
Yes, but what if he does?
VERONICA:
Then he’ll probably kill us!
WHAT DO ZOMBIES SEE?
Though it seems likely that zombies have at least diminished pain receptors, a clearer understanding of how visual information is processed by the brain may shed some light on their lack of involuntary responses, such as flinching and ducking. To that end, Rita Carter’s work
The Human Brain Book
proves an invaluable resource. Carter explains that there are actually two types of vision present in humans:
Conscious vision is the familiar process of seeing and recognizing something, while unconscious vision uses information from the eyes to guide behavior without our knowledge of it happening. 20
Put another way, our conscious sight allows us to recognize the undead mailman as a zombie coming to eat us, and our unconscious sight helps us avoid the falling tree branch we didn’t even realize we saw in the split second it comes crashing down.
Therefore, a lack of defensive posturing in the undead may be explained by a failure in its unconscious vision. Regardless of whether it can feel pain, understand a threat, or even desire to avoid physical damage, that zombie at your front door simply might not be able to see the bat in your hand before you connect with the side of its skull. This may especially be true if zombies’ reaction times are greatly slowed, as is often theorized.
THE BEST DEFENSE IS A GOOD OFFENSE
Findings out of Italy suggest that the undead’s lack of defensive behavior may have more to do with their hardwired strategy of coping with the threat they face than with their visual abilities.
In August 2010, researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory discovered a switch in the human brain that controls fear, identifying the specific type of neuron that determines how animals react to frightening stimuli. When the switch is “up,” a passive, fear-based response is triggered. When the switch is “down,” aggression takes hold.
Study leader Cornelius Gross clarified the results, explaining that they were not blocking the actual fear but just changing the animals’ responses to that fear. So in the case of zombies, their complete lack of defense, even when experiencing severe bodily injury, could simply mean that their fear switch is locked in the down
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