eighty-second

Chris Merritt, musician and zombie aficionado, emailed me yesterday in response to my recent post about the possibility of trying to use my injured knee as a means to blend into any zombie communities that might take hold in the near future.  For the public good, I thought it best to reproduce his statements here, in case someone took to heart my joking tone in that post.  Remember, kids, zombies might be funny, but they pose a serious danger in our society.

Just one correction: sorry, this is going to be of embarrassing for you.  Your post contains a glaring error.  Zombies can "sense" the presence of other zombies, and so regardless of how you act, a zombie can always tell if you are really a zombie or not.  Some conjecture that they have very precise motion detecting skills and can recognize the difference between someone faking to be a zombie and the real thing, this process all being very instinctual and far removed from logic, of course.  Some think it has more to do with the presence of the virus Solanum, which is the sole creator of the undead.  As the virus takes complete control of the brain, rendering the frontal lobe useless, it in effect creates an almost entirely new organ, which is inferior in almost every way to a healthy human brain, the exceptions, of course, are sensory perception and the fact that it is oxygen-independent.  A zombie can see, hear, and smell just as well as a living human being.  A popular theory, however, is that they tend to rely on olfactory smell more than sound and sight, and can smell the living with keen perception.  As Max Brooks writes in his definitive survival guide,

"Unlike with sound, the undead have a more acute sense of smell.  In both combat situations and laboratory tests, they have been able to distinguish the smell of living prey above all others.  In many cases, and given ideal wind conditions, zombies have been known to smell fresh corpses from a distance of more than a mile.  Again, this does not mean that ghouls have a greater sense of smell than humans, simply that they rely on it more.  It is not known what particular secretion signals the presence of prey: sweat, pheromones, blood, etc.  In the past, people seeking to move undetected through infested areas have attempted to "mask" their human scent with perfumes, deodorants, or other strong-smelling chemicals.  None were successful.  Experiments are now under way to synthesize the smells of living creatures as a decoy or even repellent to the walking dead.  A successful product is still years away." (reference 1)

Historical research, coupled with laboratory and field observation, have shown that the walking dead have been known to attack even when all their sensory organs have been damaged or completely decomposed.  Does this mean that zombies possess a sixth sense?  Perhaps.  Living humans use less than 5% of their brain capacity.  It is possible that the Solanum virus utilizes an unused section of the brain that has been forgotten by evolution. 

Sorry, W!  The fact remains that zombies can not be tricked or mislead in any way.  That sort of thinking is going to get you killed.

References:
1. Brooks, Max.  The Zombie Survival Guide, 2003.  Three Rivers Press, New York.