# racial memory? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 15, 2009, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/racial-memory/481382 "2009-01-15T04:19:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Enola\_Straight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dec6dc/32.png) [@Enola\_Straight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Straight)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/racial-memory/481382/1 "2009-01-15T04:19:47Z")
They say that Man’s multi-cultural myths and legends of dragons are in fact racial memories; instinctual reactions to the draconic/saurian anatoform, imprinted in our brains. What if historical myths of vampires and werewolves are the same thing? Even our modern myth of flesh eating zombies? Is there anything in Natural History which supports our species’ biological tendency to be “infected” with some disease that causes an individual to turn and prey upon it’s own species? I felt this post too “far out” to put in GQ, so here it is. ---
**Author:** ![ToeJam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dfb087/32.png) [@ToeJam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ToeJam)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/racial-memory/481382/2 "2009-01-15T04:34:46Z")
Is this similar to what you’re looking for: [Porphyria](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porphyria#Culture_and_history) ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/racial-memory/481382/3 "2009-01-15T04:41:13Z")
> [@Enola\_Straight](#): > > They say that Man’s multi-cultural myths and legends of dragons are in fact racial memories; instinctual reactions to the draconic/saurian anatoform, imprinted in our brains. Well, humans [appear to be hardwired to fear snakes](http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/10/1004_snakefears.html), so it makes sense that we’d often create scary stories about serpentine monsters. If “they say” we have instinctual reactions to saurian shapes, they’re kinda flaky, IMO. > [@](#): > > What if historical myths of vampires and werewolves are the same thing? > > Even our modern myth of flesh eating zombies? > > Is there anything in Natural History which supports our species’ biological tendency to be “infected” with some disease that causes an individual to turn and prey upon it’s own species? If we had such a “racial memory,” don’tcha think zombie-stories would be older than a century? They’re considerably younger than that, if “zombie” means “flesh-eating mindless undead named zombie.” There is a disease that causes an individual to become highly aggressive toward its own species: rabies. Testosterone can do the same thing. People appear to have an instinctive loathing of dead bodies, also, which makes total sense: dead bodies are great disease vectors, and folks who revile them are likelier to survive to reproduce than folks who roll around on the ground licking them. It therefore makes sense that we’d have scary stories about dead bodies, also. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/racial-memory/481382/4 "2009-01-15T04:58:08Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > dead bodies are great disease vectors, and folks who revile them are likelier to survive to reproduce than folks who roll around on the ground licking them. _Now_ you tell me. BTW, anyone have a breath mint? ---
**Author:** ![AllWalker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/db5fbb/32.png) [@AllWalker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AllWalker)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/racial-memory/481382/5 "2009-01-15T06:46:28Z")
Behavioural changes can occur due to infection: [toxo](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxo#Behavioral_changes) being one of the more commonly heard of ones. There was also research which shows that memories have a molecular basis, but a) it is far from universally accepted and b) I’m way to hungry to dig up a cite right now. But racial memories might by more than just cultural, yet more rapidly established than just genetic. Not something I necessarily belief, but you never know. ---
**Author:** ![Gam\_Zeh\_Yaavor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3e96dc/32.png) [@Gam\_Zeh\_Yaavor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gam_Zeh_Yaavor)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 7:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/racial-memory/481382/6 "2009-01-15T07:55:19Z")
With regards to an instinctive fear of someone gnawing on you, there’s a lot of evidence of casual cannibalism among other, earlier hominids. Unlike the ritualized and uncommon form of cannibalism that you see in some modern human societies, some communities of cavemen seem to have snacked on each on each other without any symbolic pretense: I recall reading about one (Spanish?) Neanderthal site that produced the remains of several individuals who had apparently been consumed within a short time span (making it unlikely that they were incidental or natural deaths), whose remains were then discarded among the butchered bones of other food animals. So if we can have an instinctive fear of snakes, as mentioned above, maybe there’s a possibility that this could produce an ancestral fear of being devoured by a humanoid just because he wanted to eat you. > [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > There is a disease that causes an individual to become highly aggressive toward its own species: rabies. Testosterone can do the same thing. Rabies doesn’t tend to cause aggression in humans as it does in other animals, sadly, though it does cause agitation and disorientation in its earlier stages. ---
**Author:** ![Omegaman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/e480ec/32.png) [@Omegaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omegaman)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/racial-memory/481382/7 "2009-01-15T16:31:24Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > People appear to have an instinctive loathing of dead bodies, also, which makes total sense: dead bodies are great disease vectors, and folks who revile them are likelier to survive to reproduce than folks who roll around on the ground licking them. > Daniel > [@Koxinga](#): > > _Now_ you tell me. > > BTW, anyone have a breath mint? Yeah, probably a good thing these people don’t reproduce anyway. Dumb as a stick and breath that smells like carcasses.