DEEP WEB FACTS

"FAKE DEATH"

By Potter

Let me start this article with once upon time when things were sort of uncivilized - when Romeo and Juliet were played by the trading of death to life and life to death. In which, Shakespeare uttered in his book,

"Oh, here will I set up my everlasting rest, and shake the yoke, of inauspicious stars from this world-wearied flesh.

Eyes, look your last! Arms, take your last embrace! And, lips, O you the doors of breath,seal with a righteous kiss, a dateless bargain to
engrossing death!" - Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare

Yes. That's agonizing indeed. That marked the tragedy of the two tricked - from feigning and until dying became real.

Whoopsie! Feigning sleep. Yes, I heard it. And I should tell that it actually didn't just exist in Shakespeare's books, but also in reality - there's that thing.

"Fake death" or scientifically, Apparent Death - that's how it's called.

And our Romeo and Juliet here are these rarely-heard Playing Opposum and Natrix Helvetica or simply called the Barred Grass Snake.

Apparent death or in other words "playing dead" is a behavior that our main characters here (in this article) use to deceive predators. It's being part of their defense mechanisms. They - especially Playing Opposum - are just really good actors when they feel their lives are at risk. In science, this form of animal deception is an adaptive behavior which is also called tonic immobility - the tendency of an animal to temporarily be paralysed. And there's one more thing that adds to the perfection of their acting. An animal like Opposum produces "deathly" scent to surely convince predators that it's dead - totally. Clap clap for that!

It's not only those animals humans can induce tonic immobility with/to. It's also with Sharks, dogfish, tiger sharks, and white-tip reef sharks. Science revealed that to arouse tonic immobility with those fishes, one has to place his hands lightly on the sides of the animal's snout in the area surrounding the eyes. In sharks, during this, dorsal fins straighten, and both breathing and muscle contractions become more still and relaxed.

Besides, apparent death may also occur in humans (but of course, it's slightly different to what happened to Romeo and Juliet). It happens when someone undergoes certain trauma, including sexual assault.

As to Klaf Juliano, one of the contributors on the Journal of Affective Disorders, "While "freezing" in response to life-threatening situations is well-known, the common "freeze" response exhibited by victims of rape is often misunderstood as passive consent "

And guys, that includes when you're hurt so much. You could undergo tonic immobility or "fake death". There! You all have now the drift why broken-hearted would always say, "Am dead now."

Apparent death usually lasts from minutes to hours. It depends on the body mechanism of the animal. And in case to humans, the recovery depends on the strongness of the immunity of the affected.