Depends on how we define zombies. Something that lives beyond it's intended lifespan? You can do that by cryogenically freezing things and bringing them back.
As far as "dead, reanimated beings", I think there's a possibility. Nothing more, though.
In 1937, while researching folklore in Haiti, Zora Neale Hurston encountered the case of a woman who appeared in a village, and a family claimed she was Felicia Felix-Mentor, a relative who had died and been buried in 1907 at the age of 29. Hurston pursued rumors that the affected persons were given powerful psychoactive drug, but she was unable to locate individuals willing to offer much information. She wrote:
“ What is more, if science ever gets to the bottom of Voodoo in Haiti and Africa, it will be found that some important medical secrets, still unknown to medical science, give it its power, rather than gestures of ceremony.[3] ”
Several decades later, Wade Davis, a Harvard ethnobotanist, presented a pharmacological case for zombies in two books, The Serpent and the Rainbow (1985) and Passage of Darkness: The Ethnobiology of the Haitian Zombie (1988). Davis traveled to Haiti in 1982 and, as a result of his investigations, claimed that a living person can be turned into a zombie by two special powders being entered into the blood stream (usually via a wound). The first, coup de poudre (French: 'powder strike'), includes tetrodotoxin (TTX), a powerful and frequently fatal neurotoxin found in the flesh of the pufferfish (order Tetraodontidae). The second powder consists of dissociative drugs such as datura. Together, these powders were said to induce a death-like state in which the will of the victim would be entirely subjected to that of the bokor. Davis also popularized the story of Clairvius Narcisse, who was claimed to have succumbed to this practice.
The process described by Davis was an initial state of death-like suspended animation, followed by re-awakening—typically after being buried—into a psychotic state. The psychosis induced by the drug and psychological trauma was hypothesised by Davis to re-inforce culturally-learned beliefs and causing the individual to reconstruct their identity as that of a zombie, since they 'knew' they were dead, and had no other role to play in the Haitian society. Societal reinforcement of the belief was hypothesized by Davis to confirm for the zombie individual the zombie state, and such individuals were known to hang around in graveyards, exhibiting attitudes of low affect. In 1988, Wes Craven, director of the Nightmare on Elm Street horror series of movies, filmed The Serpent and the Rainbow, which diverges significantly from the book.
Davis' claim has been criticized, particularly the suggestion that Haitian witch doctors can keep “zombies” in a state of pharmacologically induced trance for many years.[4] Symptoms of TTX poisoning range from numbness and nausea to paralysis (particularly of the muscles of the diaphragm), unconsciousness, and death, but do not include a stiffened gait or a death-like trance. According to psychologist Terence Hines, the scientific community dismisses tetrodotoxin as the cause of this state, and Davis's assessment of the nature of the reports of Haitian zombies is viewed as overly credulous.[5]
Scottish psychiatrist R. D. Laing highlighted the link between social and cultural expectations and compulsion, in the context of schizophrenia and other mental illness, suggesting that schizogenesis may account for some of the psychological aspects of zombification.[6]
Parasites. They are mind controllers, destroying natural instincts and reprograming animals to suit the parasites' needs. There are human parasites, but none of actually had any nuerological effects. Most of them take a cut of your nutrients(tapeworms), and some even eat flesh(hookworms).
I was going to link that Cracked article It's a lot like the video of the caterpillar, who gets taken over by larvae which eventually effect it's brain. The Caterpillar then takes sides with the larvae as they spin a web or something - it's actually pretty scary shit.
Well there are certain parasite that affect human's brains to a degree it's those ones in africa that live in water then getting in limbs infect them breed then make the host feel like they are burning up so the jump in water and the parasite gets released back into the water.
Ok so not proper mind control but to a degree it is, also you have Pryons or whatever they are called which are like mad cow disease..
Its possible for them to exist, but not in the traditional way. If nanotechnology comes out, then a bug in some nanobytes could cause them to take over your brain, leading them to create more and more nanobytes, so you would be more of a cyborg, but a zombie nonetheless.
We think of zombies as mainly dead. Americans are half-way there. We are definitely brain dead. All we need is some chemical or biological weapon that slows us down as if we all just got mass roofied.
LordWorm
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As far as "dead, reanimated beings", I think there's a possibility. Nothing more, though.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zombie#Haitian_Vodou
I know they aren't dead but it's still interesting.
discuss
Well, shit.:(
Ok so not proper mind control but to a degree it is, also you have Pryons or whatever they are called which are like mad cow disease..
So yes zombies are real.