The Werewolves Community - Essay Example

Werewolves The subscription of humans beings to faith systems are evident through the religious framework asthey are seen right from early periods of civilizations with evolutionally changes being instrumental in explaining the current day’s faiths and believe systems. Regal explains the purpose and implication of the theories of Charles Darwin in explaining the impacts of evolutionary power that has been in operation even behind scenes. In a particular, history of the human culture revolves around the existence of ‘super human’ beings that had powers to be transformed into beasts and thus command great fear and terror among the human beings. The werewolves (though referred to differently from a place to another) were among such species of living creatures, which roamed the thick forests as well as within the dark of the nights and which, according to many societies, were very dangerous, and thus required to be avoided by human beings (Regel1-5). Communities and social groups developed legends, which would explain the existence of these werewolves, the manners to fight them and ways to kill them as they were seen to kill people. Many cultures in the past had much ascription to beliefs of existence of these beings (traces that are in existent even in the present day era). Despite the continued existence of these figures of werewolves within the fiction fields in the film industry, there is a real concern of the extinction of these werewolves as they were. Nevertheless, the existence of the Bigfoot, the Yeti as well as the Sasquatch in the 19th century raises concerns of whether this would point to the evolution of the traditional werewolves; and in case, this would be the explanation to the evolution. The theory of natural selection and evolution as described by Charles Darwin has been pointed to be the most influential among other theoretical frameworks explaining the existence and extinction of living species. With cultural beliefs, cultural changes and superstitions being of important in explaining the cessation of the werewolves biological reality, the Darwinian evolution theory centered on natural selection and was thus equally central in this explanation. Nevertheless, the critics of such theories of evolution (as they are used in explaining the disappearance of these species werewolves) would have it that this theory does not hold essence in explaining the emergence of other scientific legitimate monsters as they are. History has it that the existence of werewolves could be traced quite far back though some writers, especially within the Roman culture, would question the theories many years after the claim. However, the existence of these beasts was not exclusive as other forms of these supernatural species were evident taking the form of dog-headed men as well as the Cynocephali. Nevertheless, discussions in favor for or against the character of these species would lack definite position as these, unlike the werewolves would be friendly and or dangerous to human beings. However, the contradiction notable within the traditional scope of witchcraft and werewolves was that though witchcraft had some notable attention within the learned circles, werewolves had no regard within these circles whatsoever (Husic 1-2). The enlightenment period in history brought about more concerns as regards the existence and the capabilities of these ‘super’ being as were portrayed. There were concerns within the religious circles of the ability of demons to infuse into normal human beings and bring about transformation of the beings into these forms of monsters. Scientific revolution brought about psychological explanations to the issue of lycanthropy and served to substitute physical explanations as used to be. Therefore, the evolutionary forces as illustrated through the scientific explanations were pivotal in explaining the evolution of the monsters while at the same time the monsters are portrayed to have been critical in formulation of these theories. It was however, within the evolutionary theoretical frameworks that debates for and against arose. The debates for the evolutionary theories as postulated by the scientific view of Darwin faced objections from the debates against which claimed that such ideas of the past species like the sea serpents and other ‘super’ species were only mythical and could only be proved right through physical evidence. Moreover, they supported that the mythical frameworks would explain the existence of even more wondrous species. Despite the little attention that Darwin is said to have accorded to the monsters existence and evolution within his theory, supports of evolution point to the theory as having been critical in explaining the whole controversy of existence and extinction of the monsters. Darwin is actually seen to have avoided the explanation but used a rather different approach in biological explanation with an example from heredity within the plants. He therefore circumstantially and intentionally avoided the explanation of the werewolves or other monster as seen within his theorem. However, through his other writings, Darwin appreciated the different courses taken by different species in matters of evolution and thus pointed out that dogs and other primates would take very different lines of evolution and as such would have no point of commonality of one causing the other. This therefore according to the supporters of scientific theories would resolve the earlier mentioned standstill of the likelihood of normal humans changing into the fearful beasts and become doglike as others postulated. The natural historians also in support of evolution outran the claim of living creatures changing shape to adopt rather different shapes such as the werewolves’ shapes. For instance, organisms would temporarily change in times of extreme fear, or while attacking for defense but would resume the normality within a given period. Missing links as postulated by literature reveal that there lacks a coherent link between the monsters werewolves and the ape as the classical writers would illustrate through having trickery from such primates leading to harm and death. This would raise the argument that these monsters actually operated in the form of normal apes but practiced trickery. Moreover, ignorance within the traditional setup led to the unsupported generalization of species as seen with ‘Orang-Qutang’ as used to generalize all primates living within the tropical zones. In the analysis of cultural frameworks of variations between the human beings and the apes, varying positions of thinking reveal the racial perceptions where the whites had a discriminative sinister perception of the color people and were affiliated with the monsters. This is evident within the depictions of various cultures as to what they held in myths as well as reality of the existence of monsters (Baring-Gould 15-33). However, despite the notable variation of the perceived ‘monsters’ within the different cultures as shown, the werewolf was quite a distinct figure with the ability to change form. The problem presented with this feature was therefore the one of classification as other types of monsters such as the sea serpents and the Bigfoot were easily classified. In conclusion, though the evolutionists hold and explain the demise of the werewolves, some currently existing cultural systems that postulate the existence of the same works contradict the perceptions. This therefore points out that the Darwinian evolutionary force does not explicitly explain the extinction of these monsters. There are actually current cultures within America who still hold to the belief of the existence of these monsters with the ability to shape lift and who are actually unfriendly to humans. Classical writers revealing the trickery and the ultimate harm of humans by the monsters as illustrated by stories, form a basis on which historical evolutionists argue and are thus very critical in the whole discussion. These trickery aspects of studying the monsters are instrumental in passing moral authority within a culture from a generation to another as was being used traditionally. Works cited Baring-Gould Sabine.The Book of Were-Wolves. NY: Cosimo, Inc, 2010, Print Husic, Geoff.A Vampire by Any Other Name Vampires, Werewolves, and Witches of the Slavs, Balkan Peoples and other Lands: A Linguistic and Cultural Adventure; Slavic & Special Languages Librarian University of Kansas Libraries Exhibition in Watson Library. May-June 2010.Web. 18 June 2013 Regel, Brian.where have all the werewolves gone?Did the arrival of Darwins theory of evolution put paid to a widespread belief in half-human creatures?Fortean times, March2010.Web. 8 June 2013. Read More