CLAIRVIUS NARCISSE (Posted 2007-11-27 14:56:14 by ArchPaladin) Clairvius [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clairvius_Narcisse ] [wikipedia.org] was a Haitian man whose story serves as possibly the world's only testament to the actual existence of zombies. Now, when I say zombies, I don't mean zombies in the modern _28 Days Later_ type understanding. This rendition of zombies has come about through many years of cinematic and artistic alterations on a far more basic folklore concept originating in the jungles of the Caribbean. What we picture as zombies today has come about because we've taken an old tale in folklore and imprinted upon it our fears of modern medical advancement, multiple-drug-resistant bacteria, plagues, and pestilence, and combined that with what have become traditional elements of the horror and gore genres of entertainment. What I'm talking about is the old school rendition of zombies. Old school zombies are people who have died and were reanimated by a voodoo shaman for his nefarious purposes. They shamble about, display very limited intelligence, avoid sunlight, and seem to have no will of their own. They do not have an appetite for human flesh or brains, although I suppose a shaman could intentionally feed a zombie such items. Anyway, the story of Clairvius involves his being poisoned into a state of paralysis and having his death feigned at the hands of his brother, who was quarreling with him over land at the time. After Clairvius was interred, he was later exhumed and fed a paste-like substance that kept him in a state of hallucination and susceptible to suggestion by his new handler - a voodoo sorcerer known as a "bokor". As long as Clairvius was fed this paste substance on a regular basis, he would be kept in this mental state indefinitely, which would produce the symptoms I gave above that describe what old-school zombies were like. The fact that we are aware of his story today is because Clairvius outlived the bokor, and returned to his right mind after the effects of the drugs he was being fed wore off. This story was cataloged and presented with others in the book _The Serpent and the Rainbow_. See the Wikipedia link at the beginning of this post for more details about Clairvius and the book. So I did some digging around through the pharmacology that was suggested in that link as well as a couple of other following links to try and determine just what compounds would be necessary to recreate this zombie state. Notably, while a lot of the book containing Clairvius' story is debated, the idea behind pharmacologically creating a zombie is considered plausible. Below is a rehash of what I found: * Tetrodotoxin - used in the initial stage to simulate a person's death. This is a very well-known compound and is used extensively in neuroscience. It is a potent neurotoxin that quickly causes paralysis in small doses - the effects are temporary if death does not result from too high a dose. This compound is used defensively by many creatures (most of them aquatic); the most famous of these is the pufferfish. * Scopolamine - used as a hallucinogen to induce mental confusion and compliance. This compound is technically a drug used to treat a variety of seemingly unrelated issues, but in a potent enough dose it acts as a hallucinogen. It is not often used recreationally, as the trips it produces are not euphoric in nature. The drug itself is part of a family of drugs known as anticholinergic drugs, which affect muscle coordination and a host of other processes in the body, which would give the user a shambling appearance, dilated pupils, stupor, and a number of other zombie-related symptoms. The drug itself is found in appropriate concentrations in the Datura species of plant, though it is apparently produced in any of the nightshade family of plants. There was indication that other compounds from psychoactive toads were also used, but I could not get enough information on them for me to be sure that they would play a part in the zombification process. I personally believe you can get zombies from these two compounds alone if given in the correct doses. While we have good information about the dosage of tetrodotoxin necessary to induce a feigned death state for a couple of days (although you'd have to have a natural burial or at least skip the embalming process if you wanted to carry out this step), the amount of scopolamine required is not well known. Only experimentation could tell you this one. It's interesting to see the kernel of truth in the zombie legend. It's more interesting to see that our modern chemistry knowledge has determined a plausible explanation for how a zombie state could be recreated. It will be even more interesting, on a personal level, to find out if my studies of TCM will allow me to reproduce a generic formula for this state, so that we would not be limited to just these two compounds, but could instead use any of a number of plant candidates. -------- There are no comments on this post.