Humanity's Prospects After Zombie Apocalypse?

[BillyRay]

So we're sticking with the standard Romero paradigm of shambling zombies, & any death results in reanimation? Right? Good. Because if we had running "raptor" zeds, let's face it, Kids, we're #$%-ed. (And reanimation due to demonic possession or Alien Control has too many X factors to account for.) Now Wyld said Global Zombie Infestation. We'd have to take into account where in the world the whole Zombocalypse begins. If it starts in Iraq or China, we'd have some time in the West to ready ourselves. If it starts in D.C. or London, different scenario. Those areas not immediately swarming with Infected have a short time to take action. But that may be all the time we'd need to put a military/medical plan into motion (I agree with JD that there could already be a plan in place). There will be a lack of reliable information, but plenty of finger pointing, in the first couple days. And there will be a temporary suspension of Civil Liberties, so that's a whole other series of problems... I agree with Darth that there's a lot of stupid people with no survival skills/common sense out there. Those'll be the first ones et', no doubt. I have the naive belief that enough communities and neighborhoods can organize and work together to get through the First Wave of Infected. Also, don't discount folks like us, the Zombie Movie Nuts. We'll know what we're dealing with. We'll know to shoot for the head. We'll know the loved one shambling towards us isn't our loved one anymore. Folks like us will keep a lot of people alive. But let's say we don't. Let's say we end up with a Out-of-control Global Pandemic that makes the Black Plague look like the sniffles. There'll still be enough holdouts - the survivalists, the privilaged, the tenacious, to rebuild some kind of society when the dead stop movin'. BTW, Have we established (in this thread, or in general on the board) what the decomposition rate of the Living Dead might be? Does the Z-virus suspend the natural putrification of necrotic tissue to any degree? If the Zeds wind up walkin' for a long while, it'll be a bit more difficult for the survivors. The society we'll be starting over with will be a lot tougher. We'll have to do without a lot of comforts and conveniences for probably a few decades. The infrastructure (roads, electrical and fresh water) will obviously deteriorate, but there will still be enough tools, books, canned goods, and (more important) living skills on hand to use. There will be new rules to deal with every death coming back to eat you. It'll be a harsher society in many ways. Most of the early survivors are going to be the reactionaries, the "gun nuts", the survivalists. Hard people for a hard world. But as communities develop, improve and even thrive, we'll see the Human side of civilization come back in a big way. But I'm a bit over-optimistic, so I've been told.

[AcesandEights]

BTW, Have we established (in this thread, or in general on the board) what the decomposition rate of the Living Dead might be? Does the Z-virus suspend the natural putrification of necrotic tissue to any degree? If the Zeds wind up walkin' for a long while, it'll be a bit more difficult for the survivors. In Day Logan gives a pretty grim estimate that whatever animates the dead retards the decomposition process keeping the tissues viable for years longer than would otherwise be the case. Don't have a quote handy at the moment.

[Wyldwraith]

Will start providing my "take" and answering the questions posited. 1) I can buy a MILD retarding of the putrefaction process by accepting that the "Reanimation Microbe" is exceptionally hostile to other microbes. HOWEVER, maggot damage (this includes the other bugs that flock to corpses), gas bloat, and (the biggie) Environmental Exposure would be unaffected and proceed normally. Figure a Reanimate in reasonably intact shape at time of reanimation is good for 90-120 days of GAR-depicted "Zombie Optimal" functioning. Followed by another 90-120 days of downhill, steady degradation of the body, resulting finally in an immobile reanimate feebly twitching as humans approach. This rate would be good for temperate climate areas and a bit colder. Sub-Tropical Climate-Areas would increase the rate of decay by perhaps 25-33%, while Tropical Climate could cut the "Undead Lifespan" in half. Zombies that for whatever reason remain indoors 100% of the time could last far longer in some areas, but in Tropical Climates being indoors could actually accelerate the decay, depending on the structure. 2) The only way I accept the GAR "Everyone alive is a carrier, so everyone who dies, for any reason reanimates" paradigm is if the cause is some sort of airborne, incredibly contagious/virulent pathogen. I don't believe in "Mysterious Radiation Saturation" permanently reanimating all corpses on Earth. Yes, everyone would be a carrier, so in all likelihood events as far as how GAR depicts the Infection's spread would be reasonably accurate. 3) Zombies are shamblers, Romero-style. There are just too many biological impediments to the creation of fast, highly coordinated Dawn '04 zombies. If for no other reason, the cessation of cellular maintenance of the inner ear would quickly and DRASTICALLY impair zombie balance and coordination. At BEST, or I should say worst, extremely fresh zombies (As in first 24 hours of reanimated existence) would be about 2/3rds as coordinated, have about 2/3rds the reaction time of the average human, and be maybe 3/4ths as fast. Under no circumstances would the truly reanimated dead be as high-performance as Dawn '04 zombies. Yes, the VERY RARE ***Individual*** Zombie, who for some physical reason was much faster than the average person in life, MIGHT be as fast as the average person in death. Impairment in proportional after all. If the physical specimen was top .1% conditioned in life, it may have a short window while its "fresh" where its close to as fast as average life humans. 4) For purposes of this discussion, we will assume the cause of the Zombie Apocalypse is a virus that has spread undetected to most of the major population centers at the same time due to widespread international travel. Due to Living Humans having absolutely no symptoms from the virus they've become passive contagious carriers of, and due to the fact that the Increase of Viral Load in individuals is relatively equal, while Reanimation requires an expired human to have reached X Viral Load in their system, where X is the minimum amount required to trigger immediate reanimation after physical death, we can assume the Infection will be all over the place (with the exception of a very few population bases that for whatever reason have ZERO contact with the outside world). In the event a person dies before their Viral Load is sufficient to trigger immediate (by immediate I mean as depicted by GAR. Anywhere from 3-5 minutes, up to 30-40 minutes in the rarest of cases) reanimation, the individual will remain dead for now, but the virus will continue replicating in their tissues, albeit at a somewhat reduced rate due to vascular system shutdown cutting off an easy means of viral dissemination. At some point (2-4 hours MAXIMUM) the dead body will reanimate when its Viral Load reaches X-Level. Apologies about the poor paragraph construction on #4, was just trying to convey a lot of detail as fast as it came to me, quick and dirty. Note: I retain my belief that zombie eyesight will be the first of a ghoul's active 3 senses (taste and touch being pretty much nil) to deteriorate, followed by hearing, and then smell long after. Sight will begin to deteriorate within a week of reanimation, but remain functional enough to be useful (at ever decreasing efficiency) until the zombie has reached the halfway point on its way to completely putrefying. Hearing and Smell will be impacted much slower, but hearing can as a rule of thumb be considered significantly impaired by the time the zombie is 2/3rds of the way to falling apart for good. Different zombies in different environments will obviously experience significant variance in the rate of Hearing and Smell deterioration, but eyesight will start to go and continue deteriorating pretty much at the set rate I described. Note: "Deteriorated" does NOT mean BLIND AS A BAT. To start it will be fine detail and color loss, significant impairment of night vision and speed at which undead eyes adjust to changing light levels next, and only then will eyesight BEGIN to become more liability than asset to the hunting zombie. Hope this clarifies the hypothetical scenario, though BY ALL MEANS I'm open to and encourage different views of what I've described and continue to entertain alternate theories of these "constants" of zombie decay. Just wanted to answer some of the general key questions in as much detail as I could quickly relate. Will have to pardon me for the haphazard manner of parts of this. My pain levels are skyrocketing, and that's proving to be quite the distraction. Ok, please continue.

[DTyra]

Societies without heavy gun control will do well. If it's GAR zombies we can call out the girl scouts and deal with it for the most part. Fast zombies, Ragers, another story, but humanity would survive.

[SRP76]

We're all lunchmeat. It might take awhile, but we're finished. Just think: every single place where a person is right now, will have zombies. The bathroom in room 212 at Motel 6, the cooler at your local liquor store, you name it. You're talking about surviving every nook and cranny on Earth. Not happening. There are simply more zombies in places than you know places that exist. If we were Borg, all hooked into the same brain, so we all have a total knowledge of everything on the planet, and instantaneous action from any thought of the collective consciousness, then maybe. But we aren't, and don't. We can't even handle one terrorist network. How in fuck are we going to handle literally a billion enemies, cropping up in every back bedroom on the planet? No way.

[Wyldwraith]

You make a good point SRP, But by the same token, the zombies aren't Borg either. Further, they have no capacity for real thought or genuine investigation. Yes, accidentally kicking a can while sneaking down a back alley could draw the attention of the near zombie(s), IF the sound of the can skittering over stone is the most prevalent sound in the zombies range of hearing at that time. See what I'm getting at? People don't have to be terribly clever. They have to keep their asses intact for about 180-210 days (at which point the Mass Putrefaction of that billion zombies will be WELL underway), and then they need to use the skills they developed during that period to survive the more intermittent, but still dangerous period that would follow subsequently. Hell, in places like Central and South America the zombies would be goop on the ground in like 30, 45 days MAX. If the rainforest is wet enough to make prolonged exposure to it sufficient to soften LIVING human skin and make it tear easily, what do you think those conditions would do to dead flesh? Double Hell, it's colder but suffers from just as much humidity/dampness. The rainforest area in Washington State...Olympia I believe its called. Was just watching an episode of Dual Survival set there. The hippie who walks around everywhere barefoot was encountering major problems because the sopping wet ground was making his feet soft and tear-prone in just a COUPLE hours after being dropped off in it. My point is that yes, in many areas the zombies will of course exterminate the local population of humans, but in other areas there will be a variety of factors that may very well come into play that work against the zombies/in human favor. Just one more example: Take the Thousand Lakes area in Minnesota. A fairly good environment climate-wise for zombies to last a substantial amount of time. There are TONS of little islands out in the larger of those lakes...and tons of marshy areas just getting to the edge of many of the lakes. This isn't Land. Regular immersion (even partial, such as from the calves down) in water would be DEVASTATING to zombie flesh. As for a zombie that tried the Land-esque "Walk across the bottom to humans on other side" trick, that zombie just reduced its effective functioning period to 72 hours max. I guess in the end it would be a race to see if humanity could stay hydrated, sheltered and fed until the largest density of ghouls became inactive/non-functional/immobile due to decay. Yes, in a GAR depiction of zombies that somehow retard all decay for YEARS, I expect humanity's fate would be a lot grimmer. However, if the bulk of the zombies rot away before the average survivalist/Militia-member's homemade bunker runs out of M.R.Es, there's something to be said for our prospects as a species when coupled with the isolated populations that never became infected to begin with. (Hell, there are STILL Amazon Basin tribes that we whites have never even SEEN, let alone had anything to do with.) Which doesn't even touch on the crews at sea when the zombie shit hits the fan, who park their Cruiser Escort next to an uninhabited Pacific island with multiple freshwater springs and plenty of food to supplement their ship's stores. How would those folks get killed?

[Legion2213]

I doubt that zacks would last long in the Australian outback...they'd be desiccated in a few days, I don't care what spooky method is used to explain their durability as living corpses, they'd be dried out husks within a week. Any Aussie survivors with access to water in such an area would only have to worry about living threats IMO...Hell, they probably wouldn't have to worry about them too much either...Oz can be a brutally hostile enviroment.

[Eyebiter]

Cracked just did an article on this http://www.cracked.com/article_18683...uickly_p1.html

[Publius]

Yes, Romero Zombies are slow, but when they are the majority, you will be fucked. That sounds like the "phase/step 3 - PROFIT!!" meme (originally from South Park). Phase 1: Shamblers appear Phase 2: ??? Phase 3: Shamblers are the majority, we're screwed! I'd like to see someone run the numbers.

[Wyldwraith]

Here's some numbers for you, I'm disabled to the point I cannot evade zombies on foot for longer than a few minutes. I DO, however, have two things going for me. 1) A literal, honest-to-God, no bullshit, Genius-Level IQ. 2) A Model 88 .308 I got for my birthday from my stepfather. Incidentally, I have *at this moment* (22) 100-count boxes of .308 rounds/cartridges (pick your favorite word). This doesn't even take into account my OTHER guns. Like my .45 or my 12-gauge (both of which have their own healthy stockpiles of ammo). Let's stick with the rifle though. Now, in the event the living dead somehow breach my home (a not-inconsiderable feat) before I am prepared/aware they're on the way, THE WORST-CASE SCENARIO is they kill, and stop to consume MY ENTIRE FAMILY. Why? My room is at the back of the house, with no windows of sufficient size to easily crawl through without fine motor control. So, my family's dead, but their deaths have a) filled me with a rage sufficient to (at least temporarily) overcome my Shit-My-Pants-Level terror at the sight of the walking dead, and b) bought me the precious, precious time to go for my guns, LITERALLY. I do not give a FUCK what movie this is. I double-dog-fucking-dare-you to find a SWAT TEAM that wants to come down the deathtrap-of-a-hallway leading to my bedroom, let alone a bunch of mindless zombies marching single-file down it. Suffice to say if I don't suffer from a sudden unrelated aneurysm or ridiculously unlikely heart attack or stroke at 30 years old, I AM going to shoot my way out of the damned house. Bring the ENTIRE NEIGHBORHOOD back from the dead and march them down that hallway, it'll make NO DIFFERENCE, other than how sore my shoulder is from the recoil when all is shot and dead. Ok, I've cleared the house, but I know my mobility is dick, and that if I try for a cool exit scenario I'm dogmeat in 3 minutes or less. What do I do? I go up into the attic, dragging the backpack full of ammo and my .45, while my shotgun and rifle are slung over one or both shoulders, and hence to the skylight-roof-access AFTER DESTROYING THE STAIR-LADDER BEHIND ME. So, I've got Dick for water, and same for food. I am dead in 72 hours, and non-functional probably after 2 days. IN THE MEANTIME I think I'll, I dunno...SHOOT EVERY DAMNED ZOMBIE THAT COMES WITHIN RANGE OF MY HOUSE IN THE HEAD?? So, 72 hours comes and goes. Near-death from dehydration, I eat a bullet so I don't simply reanimate and stumble off the roof and break both legs. What was the difference between me going through all that or simply letting the zombies eat me downstairs? Easy. Littered in concentric circles around my house you'll find the re-dead bodies of over TWO THOUSAND of the formerly-Living-Dead. I'm ONE punk. A disabled one at that. I showed NO intelligence or effort in even TRYING for long-term survival, yet STILL I EASILY end up in a position to while away my last hours on this Earth blowing the brains of my zombie neighbors out, until I simply come down to my last 4-5 .45 rounds (not going for a dramatic last bullet nonsense, bullets misfire after all). Assume I am the ONLY guy within 50 square miles of my home armed and in a position to reach his house's roof with guns and ammo. There AREN'T 2200 PEOPLE LIVING WITHIN 50 MILES OF ME. See where I'm going with this? You don't have to survive to take a HUGE bite out of the zombie population, you just have to last long enough to empty all your ammo into their undead brains. If ONE guy in 2,200 does what I just did, a Zombie Apocalypse isn't feasible.

[BillyRay]

Again, I stick with my theory that if enough (armed) Zombie Flick fans are aware of what's going on during the initial outbreak... headshotheadshotheadshotheadshot..etcetcetc... It's like all those old Vampire or Werewolf movies where somebody has read the books and seen the movies, and knows their main weaknesses. Alls I got at home is a cricket bat and a tire iron. For Romero Zeds, that's enough for starters. Then I get the crew together....

[Trin]

I don't think a discussion of the science and biology of zombies is very constructive in answering the two initial questions. We could (and have) spend pages discussing that sort of thing and never get to the meat of the questions. To stay on topic, about the most you need to address is: (A) are they fast or slow, and (B) how long do they remain a threat For me the answers are, Slow (per GAR), and Indefinitely (again per GAR). Although in practical terms I really think that after 3-6 months with slow zombies the second question is moot. Either the humans have become extinct or they've found a way to cope that assures long-term survival. Would humans survive? Most definitely. Anyplace that is free of zombies and knows/understands what to do with dead bodies will survive. Take any cruise ship, naval vessel, third world despot who built a wall around his compound, very sparsely populated rural area, etc. If they figure out the dangers of dead bodies they'll be fine. Would it ultimately benefit humanity? That's a really great question. The answer is almost a commentary on how a person feels about society today. Would society benefit from a global tear-down and rebuild? Hard to say. There would undoubtedly be some benefits. Common enemies breed empathy between groups. The world could sure use a dose of that right now. Health and living conditions would go to hell in the short term. But long-term better population control and a "greener" earth might result. Society might very well learn from its mistakes.

[dracenstein]

Wyld, do you ever go outside your house? Particularly some distance away? And do you always carry a gun? ie, having dinner out with friends or at church for thanksgiving, wedding, funeral. And that is when you find out about the dead resurrecting. Still confident you can nail 2000 zombies? Couple years ago, I did a thread asking where people would be at a certain time on a certain day when zombiegeddon happens. Most people would be stuck away from home and arsenal, with one of our esteemed members admitting he would be stuck in a funeral parlour! Even if you are at home and within easy reach of your guns, I seriously doubt you will nail any number of zombies. Real life is not a shoot-em-up movie. Stress will limit your skills and accuracy. If one or more of your family reaches your room, will you deny them access? If they are dying from being bitten or blood loss or heart attack, will you be able to put a bullet through their head? And if so, will any other family members about let you? Can you spare any attention to your argument with the walking dead walking down that corridor? Lucky all this is hypothetical...

[AcesandEights]

Wyld, do you ever go outside your house? Particularly some distance away? And do you always carry a gun? ie, having dinner out with friends or at church for thanksgiving, wedding, funeral. And that is when you find out about the dead resurrecting. This is based on the assumption that there is very little in the way of time or information-creep leading up to a person's first encounter with the undead, thus leaving them extremely vulnerable. An eventuality that is possible, but by no means guaranteed. People don't have to know the specifics of a situation for them to know the shit has possibly hit the fan and take some prudent actions based on whatever limited information they will have at their disposal. That's all I'm saying, as it's going to come down to people interpreting their own vision of the hypothetical in this case.

[Trin]

...try to get a discussion going on what everyone thinks concerning the prospects of survival or extinction of Humankind in the wake of a massive Global Zombie Apocalypse. If ONE guy in 2,200 does what I just did, a Zombie Apocalypse isn't feasible. According to your own OP we're supposed to be discussing in the wake of a global zombie apocalypse, but then you spend a long post stating how that premise isn't feasible? Did you derail your own thread?