Brain.

Setheme

Everyone knows - to kill a zombie, you have to kill it's brain, which was infected by a virus.
Why do they need brain? To see, to smell, to eat and to move (Brain sends information to muscles by nervous system).
That means - their brain is still alive. To keep brain working - it needs oxygen - so zombies must breathe. If they do, they need blood - to transport oxygen from lungs to the brain. That means they also need a heart to pump the blood. That means they are actully alive, and they can bleed out if u cut it's arm.

Where did I go wrong? We all know zombies are DEAD walking...

Kess73

Yeah that is a good point, and one that I have argued elsewhere many times.

The brain takes about a fifth of the total oxygen consumed by the body, and between a fifth and a quarter of all glucose used by the body. Take away oxygen and the brain basically dies and start to decompose, but there is a slight arguement that some motor functions could happen without the brain as the intrinsic spinal circuits contain the pattern generators which control the basic movement of walking. So if whatever infects the oerson and turns them into a Z is capable of replicating the outputs that the brain sends to the intrinsic spinal circuits, then movement may be possible.


The glucose side of things would be simply that if the brain does not receive the amount it needs it just shuts down and stops send outputs which are needed for basic motor functions.


Myself I tend to follow a kind of partial or slow death theory for Zs. I think at the start of the infection, they will be sprinters as they would not be technically dead, they would suffer massive brain damage and the brain would operate on a primitive level, forcing the organism (the person) to need to feed heavily as the system(the body) is failing fast and needs almost constant intake of fuel. The internal organs would start stopping, with the least needed ones stopping first and literally starting to decompose while the living ones keep working. These Zs would have pace and be uber aggressive, but as the infection takes hold they would start to die internally a lot quicker, and reach the point quickly where body/brain death occurs. Now from here in it would become a mix of actual medical science getting mixed together with massive specualtion, but take that energy cannot be created or destroyed and that it simply finds a new form, somewhere with that do we get some way of powering the now dead body, with rigor mortis starting and decomposition continuing. The rigor mortis would slow the Z down, turning the sprinter into a slow shuffler and becoming the classic Z.

Of course there are major flaws in my theory, but at some levels it makes sense and bridges the whole sprinter or shuffler debate also.

Setheme

So if ur theory is right, before they turn into classic Zombie whey can be killed just like normal people?

Kess73

Only by shooting them in the head though.

If you "kill" them by shooting/stabbing them elsewhere, then the reanimation process will still continue as it had already started.


Essentially each victim has to die to become a shuffler, but until then they are akin to rage victims in the 28 days/weeks series.


A soon to be trilogy of books that have a similar type of Z is the Morningstar strain books. The first two books are already out, and the third is being written. These books have both sprinters and shufflers in them.

http://www.themorningstarsaga.com/home.html




Anyone who liked the great Autumn series should check out the Morningstar Strain books.




And those who have not read the Autumn series, get cracking before the next book comes out. There are four books at present, made up of a trilogy and the fourth being a companion piece to the trilogy.


http://www.djmoody.co.uk/Books.htm

Doctor DooM

This thread's completely discounting the "hells full" zombies. They're the worst, not only are they trying to eat yoru brain, they're also trying to convert you to Christianity.

Kess73

SDooM wrote: »

This thread's completely discounting the "hells full" zombies. They're the worst, not only are they trying to eat yoru brain, they're also trying to convert you to Christianity.

Nah got that covered. I'll be sending the Saint Of Killers to sort those guys out.