Lycanthropy as a disease

[jamish23]

The moons causes sea tides to raise
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tide

If you gonna do a science based werewolf like Blade vampires have them changing at different phases of the moon like Ted said in Bad Moon and die by conventional means.

[someoldguy]

Jan 22, 2014 23:09:30 GMT -5 jamish23 said:

If you gonna do a science based werewolf like Blade vampires have them changing at different phases of the moon like Ted said in Bad Moon and die by conventional means.

Not necessarily.

There is a type of squid that comes up near the surface of the water during the night. Since moonlight would reveal its presence to predators below, it has evolved a system of emitting light from its undersurface to exactly match the color and brightness of the moonlight above. This renders it effectively invisible. This feat is accomplished by a type of bacteria that lives in the squid. That is, the degree of moonlight can control the actions of a bacteria, which can affect the biological activity of the host organism. The lunar cycle affects other organisms in various ways. Ref1 Ref2 Ref3

Imagine a bacteria that is affected by moonlight with the full moon triggering a catastrophic change in its activity. In particular, it causes rapid growth of atypical features in humans: fur, fangs, claws etc. This would result in an enormous drain on the body’s resources. To make up the deficit, the ravenous creature would seek large amounts of nourishment, most preferentially of human flesh and blood to minimize the time needed to restore what the creature needs. As with rabies, non-lethal bites would help spread the bacteria. And also as with rabies, there could be a compulsion to go out and bite things. When the moonlight goes away there would be a reversal, restoring the creature back to human form. The bacteria would become dormant until sufficient moonlight triggered it again. This ‘rest’ period could function to control the bacteria levels to allow the host to survive cycle after cycle. Ref4

A bacteria that could trigger such large and rapid changes could also quickly heal wounds in the host, an obviously useful survival mechanism. Conventional bullets, for example, might cause only brief damage, quickly repaired. The bullets might be expelled from the body during the refractory phase, when human form is resumed. Silver, however, has anti-bacterial properties. A silver bullet could kill the bacteria in the vicinity of the wound, preventing repair and thus actually harming or even killing the creature. Ref5

So, a scientific explanation for traditional werewolf lore – full moon and silver.

[jamish23]

It was implied in Bad Moon that werewolves are biological judging from the blood tests and changing at any moon.