Maybe you're ALL on the right track,
What if Zombie "Prey Recognition" is based on multiple pieces of information, that when COMBINED trigger an attack? For example: Zombies tend to move very slowly, with many of their muscles slack and their balance seeming a bit off. This could be what we call "The Sight Factor". Ie: Zombie instinct tells them that two-legs who move like them aren't likely food. Zombies tend to reek of gore/blood and waste, with an element of rot. Again, pre-programmed instinct could flag this as "The Scent Factor", in which that which smells rotten and gore-covered like them is not food. Moving along, zombie instinct recognizes that other zombies make short, or at best long single-note/sound/pitch noises, such as groans/wheezes/growls. Making sounds imitative of these could fool the "Sound Factor" of their instinct.
Finally, like many predators, zombie instinct may have a trigger that says "If it runs/tries to avoid me/us, it's food." Much like turning your back and moving away from a big cat, or running from an aggressive dog can move the encounter from a tense expression of hostility to an outright attack.
Taking this theory to its logical conclusion, Individual(s) who a) Move like zombies, b) Reek like zombies, c) Sound like zombies, and, finally, Don't try to evade the zombies, and remain calm as they continue to mimic the Sight/Sound/Scent-based zombie behaviors Could very well avoid triggering an attack/predatory response from the zombies around them since at that moment nothing about them fits the profile in the Undead Instinct Template of what they (the zombies) identify as prey.
Non-sentient/unthinking or not, the zombies MUST BE able to discriminate between their own kind and live human prey. If they didn't have such a capacity then every zombie who died of a very minor bite (that they later sickened, died and reanimated due to) and ISN'T covered in gore because it hasn't succeeded in acquiring a Prey-item would get mobbed and chewed on by their own kind.
One way or another, understood or not, it's only common sense that such undead predators must have a prey-recognition capacity. If it's a basic multi-part mechanism like the theoretical one I explained, all well and good because it's simple enough. However, what if it's a less cut and dried or more complex mechanism that you either can't reason out and thus evade the basis of, or one which you can do nothing about?
For example, what if the zombies have become sensitive to the "aura"/electromagnetic field which can be visually captured by Kirlian Photography, or even (like sharks) are in possession of a sensitivity to the bio-electrical discharges and the resultant low-level corona of energy created by the actions/movement of living muscles? If that was the case, it would explain the infamous but inexplicable ability of zombies to somehow "sniff out" structures in which multiple human beings are trying to law low inside of, wouldn't it?
So there's plenty of potential ways a zombie could identify prey without having the reasoning power of a field mouse. Conversely, like everything else perception-related, the more complex the zombie's prey-recognition mechanism is, the more potential means of defeating/misleading it that exist.
So no, didn't have a prob with "fooling" the zombies during Rick and Glen's "zombie walk"....course that's just personal taste.
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Originally Posted by bassman
People make incorrect assumptions all the time that have a desired effect, but because of a different reason than the people think.
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