this post was submitted on 17 Dec 2023
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133
Why don't rabies infected humans act like rabies infected animals (lemmy.today)
submitted 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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This always puzzled me. Why don't humans act much more aggressive or crazed like its often depicted with animals. Afaik there's 2 types of rabies, "dumb" and "furious" so my question is more towards the 2nd type. For example, we never hear of rabies causing a human to accidentally bite another human so why is that?

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[–] [email protected] 59 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Uneducated Opinion: Because our higher brain functions can surpress fight/flight better than most animals. It’s the same reason jumpscare movies generally don’t turn theaters into a real-life bloodbath.

By the time rabies has gotten far enough to override that, the nervous system is basically gone and we’re dead.

[–] [email protected] 66 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (3 children)

I think this explains it right here. As another commenter said "more fear than anything else". Animals act very differently than humans when they are scared, they often get very aggressive. Anecdotally, when I was younger my loving smush of a dog got hit by a car and I ran over to her and she bit the shit out of me. She was scared for her life, and that's just how her brain was wired to react.

And just so I don't leave anybody feeling awful, she made it to the vet, needed a pin in her hip, and her tail was amputated, but she went on to live to the ripe old age of 15. My bites weren't too bad because she was a small dog. No stitches needed, but I have some tiny scars left if you look really close

But if you want to feel angry about the situation, it was a cop car that she was hit by which was flying down a residential street, and the cop yelled at me and my mother and threatened to give us a ticket for having a dog off the leash. And thus my hatred for police began at the age of 10.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 11 months ago (1 children)

That was a rollercoaster of emotions

[–] AI_toothbrush 9 points 11 months ago

I gotta admit it they got me in all three thirds

[–] [email protected] 9 points 11 months ago (1 children)

It seems like a simple explanation, but the history of biology is pretty much the history of thinking we we're special and then finding out we were wrong, over and over again.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Ah the "insects don't feel pain" era. Nowadays we know that bugs can recognize human faces. Nobody knows why, they just can.