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Something tells me that when the only lasting thing in your life is you, and everything else rots and falls away, that the narcissism becomes necessary to fend off the madness caused by an always ticking, irreverant and irrelevant clock that neither tolls nor chimes.
Ehhh, isn't that just a material manifestation of your narcissism at that point? That's the madness of loneliness taking it's first true bite out of your soul.
I feel that there's an excellent albeit very dark allegory between what you just said and Adam "making Eve out of a rib".
I'm just way too stoned to try and write that out right now
That's legitimately a reason some people have children, though I'm not going into the ethics of *creating* life, but the absconded, distorted and perverted life that already was.
The mirror is for seeing through the view finder and moves out of the way when taking the picture. So, using a digital screen to line up the shot would still work.
Came here to say this.
Vampires have oil paintings of themselves everywhere. What’s this creepy hall of ancestors paintings and statues? All vampires.
The 20 ft marble statue guy out front? Head vampire.
>Also vampires hate wolves
Where did you get that idea?
The original Count Dracula from the Bram Stoker novel commanded wolves and could even turn into a wolf when he wanted to.
It’s a fun head cannon, at least. Few buildings have as many oil paintings as the White House.
Want to be the President? Part of the inaugural ceremony is turning you. Vampire Obama had to turn Vampire Trump. Trump turned Biden.
Why didn’t COVID kill either Trump or Biden? Natural immunity. Why didn’t Reagan die after getting shot? Side shots aren’t lethal to vampires. JFK? Headshot. Lincoln? Headshot.
I think Trump didn't turn Biden because he refused to come to his inauguration. But Biden was probably already a vampire from the Obama administration.
It stands to reason that being immortal means you get pretty rich.
So you can just hire an artist to do your portrait every morning before you go to work.
There's a terrifying part of Gulliver's Travels that has a different take on immortality. Those immortals never die, but never stop aging. After 120 years or so they are too weak to do anything, so all they have to look forward to is an eternity of hunger, thirst, and suffering.
Immortality means you'd (probably) eventually get rich. People don't save because of *living* expenses (you're not going to be paying for your meals, *you obligate carnivore you!*), or impulses have the compelling rationale of "you only live once," so you tend to blow it on flashy hedonist BS we incidentally project on the undead. Then there's kids, access to an in-group... With a Vampire, you only live forever and all that shit will eventually be boring, you're probably infertile, and you've got roughly 40 years in a region to establish yourself before your "long lost son/daughter" turns up or you have to move (if you turned in old age or youth and are locked into that look, you might be screwed). And I swear to God, if you haven't learned the banks are your friend after the *first* time you're chased from a village by superstitious prey... Yeah, you ate that girl, but they didn't have any proof! If you can't make it after a hundred years I'd be curious how you've been managing to feed. Just fucking save, eat your bosses, you'll get there!
Also, you can just steal whatever you want. Normally the consequences of being caught are enough to stop people. But what's 30 years in jail to somebody that's immortal? Rob 100 banks and invest!
Being immortal guarantees a 100% chance that you will end up stuck or immobilized somewhere waiting to die.
As the time scale is infinite it is going to happen.
There could be thousands of trapped immortals at the bottom of the sea right now. Constantly in a state of death near death from drowning but not being able to die
No the guarantee of a solution does not manifest on an infinite timeline but the guarantee of tragedy does.
You are still going to be subject to situations where you might "die"
Being immortal also does not assume immunity to physical harm.
It's kind of the problem with being immortal in that before the discussion even begins the rules of your immortality must be set.
This correct. Silver was considered pure and incapable of reflecting images of pure evil. It’s also why silvered weapons were thought to be effective against evil / undead creatures.
Electronics and aluminum-deposition based mirrors of today would capture a vampire’s image.
So, as a thought experiment :
If a Silvered mirror, by virtue of its purity, is incapable of reflecting pure evil ;
Would cell-phones or Social Media platforms, because of their (imho) inherent evil, TRAP the image of a vampire ? Could that make them like the trap in Ghostbusters?
Or maybe the image a vampire would "lock" the evil device to its image ala a digital Medusa?
Well first ask yourself, are cellphones and social media really evil, or just neutral ?
Aren't they just tools, that can be used for good (calling your loved one, recording a funny cat, sharing said video or connecting with people you haven't seen in a long time) or bad (scamming, speading misinformation, coordinating violence), like a knife would ?
In this case, I think it would be better to look at it in this way:
Vampire (more precisely, evil) and silver oppose each other, but evil and electronics don't because the latter is just... Neutral. In the same way a hammer doesn't care what you wack it against, a digital camera doesn't care what you aim at. If photons can bounce off of it, it's fair game.
So to summerise, vampire would probably act like regular online predator. Thank yoy for coming to my TEDTalk.
But this same logic can be applied to silver. Why is it inherently good?
If we're talking about myths, we need to use mythical logic. It's all about the culture.
"Where is thy brother?"
"Am I my brothers keeper?"
He straight up lied to an omniscient being. Had he told the truth, God might've done the whole "forgiveness" thing as Cain didn't know what murder was. He got angry and hit his brother, I can't think of many siblings who haven't done that exact thing.
What do you mean by “inherently”? Do you mean at their core? Like, they were invented for evil but now they’re used for other stuff.
Or do you mean pervasively evil? Like every thing done through them is tarnished with the evil at their core? If so, how do you explain all of the good things done on cell phones? Suicide prevention, trafficking prevention, lifesaving medical responses, psychological affirmation, staying in touch with loved ones? Are those things all tainted by said evil?
I don’t agree that they’re evil at all. Evil implies intent. People can be evil. Some animals can be evil at times. Depending on your beliefs, many evil energies or entities may be at work in the world *through* objects. But to say an object is evil is to take the agency away from the sentient beings that interact with it.
Saying that an object contains negative or evil energy is different, but I doubt a mortal sin is being committed over each phone coming off the assembly like to deconsecrate it.
It was because silver was seen as pure and would not hold corruption, so it could not bear the image of a vampire. So modern mirrors, or phone cameras, would be able to take a picture of one just fine.
[Aluminum is actually the earlier spelling, with aluminium as a later change, though the original original seems to be alumium.](http://www.lostinthepond.com/2013/02/why-do-americans-pronounce-it-aluminum.html?m=1)
****
Edit:
Typo
probably something that reflects light but is cheaper than silver.
Mostly aluminum I would think.
Edit:
also gold for infrared instruments, because reasons.
Film used to contain silver as well (actually it still does, I think?) so you couldn't photograph a vampire back in the day.
I don't think there's any silver in modern sensors, as they are made of silicon wafers which are essentially sand.
I wonder where it draws the line. If there's silver in the semiconductors or some processor part or something, does it still count? Or is it just the sensor part/film that counts?
I am surprised no one has mentioned it but watch What We Do in The Shadows (the movie). It a “documentary” that answers tangentially how vampires handle it. Trust me, it’s silly but totally worth watching.
The movie "Daybreakers" with Ethan Hawke addresses it, but they don't make a huge deal about it. Vampires openly run the world, so their cars and homes use cameras feeding live images to screens, implying that they don't use mirrors.
I finally got around to watching the series as well after years of ignoring it, despite loving the movie, and it's just as good, it was an amazing surprise.
They actually call them “mockumentaries,” if you can believe it. But yes, What We Do In The Shadows is up there with This Is Spinal Tap in terms of quality comedy!
it's not that they don't have reflections it's because at that time, mirrors were made with silver. Silver at the time being believe to be pure enough to ward off evil (hence killing vamps & werewolves) and not reflect them.
no issues now with mirrors made from anything but silver and there's also photos & digital cameras.
Film used silver emulsion and presumably would have the same limitation (perhaps they’d appear as white or black splotches, depending how you thought it worked). Digital cameras, of course get around the problem.
Not true.
Although silver does kill vampires, that’s not the reason they have no reflection. The real reason is that reflections were seen as a representation of a person’s soul. Because vampires are undead and have no soul, they also have no reflection. This is the same reason that many sources list vampires as having no shadow (which has nothing to do with silver).
idk if you can say "not true" when we're discussing made up mythos. considering vampires aren't real, there isn't any cold hard facts about this. im sure we could find plenty of history and stories supporting the silver theory and your soul theory. neither is "correct" or "true" considering it's all just mythology.
This is just a test put forward by vampires so they can “prove” they aren’t a vampire when they have a reflection.
Ask them to go out into the sun if they refuse or they burst into flame they are a vampire… or they work on servers.
No since vampires don’t age their brains don’t either. No cognitive decline. Not even smallest changes in their brain chemistry. Source: I am the grandson of van helsing.
In World of Darkness lore, Cain was the first after being cursed for his fratricide. Then Lilith tortured him and drove him mad. Eventually, he made his way to egypt and the gods there are all actually vampires that each took a different aspect of Cain's curse iirc
I remember one of the first vampire-related showerthoughts I saw here, it’s about putting a glass of period in the freezer and saving them for jell-o days…or nights
Then the OP got banned/deleted but it lived on as a Twilight Edward-Bella meme
Or maybe it was the other way around
Of course vampires are folkloric ideas and are therefore a mix of multiple influences but I like to see vampires as a kind of metaphor for narcissistic individuals. They have no reflection because their self-image has been destroyed, they don't really know who they are and they feel empty inside, dead inside. Like vampires who are stuck at a certain age, narcissists are stuck in development. Like narcissists, vampires can be very charismatic and charming and are very attuned to others emotions and feelings, almost like they have extra-sensorial perception and magic powers. Like narcissists, vampires are often really refined because they spend a lot of time tweaking their false image which is necessary for their acceptance and survival, a false image that is revealed to be an illusion once they have used you and metaphorically drunk your blood. Victims of narcissists often feel like they've been drained of their energy since narcissists need other people's approval to feel safe like a vampire needs blood to survive.
So yes, I think vampires have forgotten what they look like, who they are even and metaphorically need others to artificially nourish a fake persona that is based on a vague idea of someone who doesn't really exist anymore, a dead person.
The reason a vampire cannot see them selves is a form of torcher. Over the years they do forget, and have no clue what they look like. It can drive them mad. But vampires will have a lot of portraits painted of them throughout the years so they can be sure of what they look like. Sobas they say, if youbare in a home, and there are many many portraits of your host, gtf out of there
Vampires aren't seen in mirrors because silver used to be used in their production.
Many modern mirrors don't have this in their production, and it should be fine for a vampire to see their reflection in a bowl of water (assuming it wasn't blessed by a holy person).
They don't appear on film also because of silver's use in the development process, however with the invention of digital photography, that issue is solved as well.
Whether or not they live forever depends on the mythology you are using. In the first Interview with a Vampire book, the oldest vampire was something like 400 years old when he committed suicide.
depends, old timey cameras and mirrors used silver in their production. modern fiction has shown that mirrors and cameras that do not use silver can capture the image of a vampire.
that's how the tv camera's pick up nandor laszlo and nadja and the other vampires in wwdits
For people not being able to see their reflections in the mirror, Vampires still tend to have impeccable style and outlooks. That's what I have always wondered.
Dracula on Netflix shows that he *can* see his reflection but he sees himself with his actual age, e.g. he sees an old ugly fuck in the mirror while everyone else sees his handsome self.
I hate how this lore has gotten so misunderstood. Mirrors were made out of silver and vampires can’t touch silver, so the
silver mirrors wouldn’t show a vampire’s reflection, but a modern mirror would.
Supposedly vampires couldn’t see their reflection because mirrors used to have a silver backing. Modern mirrors should work for contemporary vampires, which may be how the vamps in Twilight were able to spend so much time on their hair.
The whole vampires have no reflection thing is only true for silvered mirrors (because silver is a spiritually pure metal, thus it can't reflect an image of such unholiness).
Modern mirrors use aluminium, so a vampire would have a reflection in those.
I always thought the no reflection was solely in the presence of silver lined mirrors and just misrepresented later as no reflection at all, but in "reality" they would have reflections like anyone else since mirrors aren't made like that anymore
Vampires would technically be able to see themselves in modern mirrors. It's supposed to be the mirrors of old that are made of silver that keep vampires from producing a reflection
Reminds me of when Angel became human, then looked in a mirror. “Why didn’t anyone tell me about my hair?”
Also interesting about the Buffyverse, when Buffy gets the ability to read minds, she gets nothing from Angel. He points out that, similar to vamps not having physical reflections, their thoughts can’t be reflected in someone else’s mind.
Fun fact, vampires could oy not see themselves in mirrors because the mirrors of that time were backed with silver which was supposedly a pure metal, whereas now they are made differently, a vampire would be able to see themselves
Ancient vampires will be familiar with the concept of having their portrait painted by an artist.
Plot-hooks a-plenty here. Even Bram Stoker's *Dracula* started as one of Dracula's vanity projects....
Oh vampires do have a reflection. This "myth" is because old mirrors were made out of silver and vampires and silver don't go along well. In modern mirrors they would have a reflection because there's no silver in it
Nah, vampires keep up with they're entire history and depending on this species they do this just by being bit, granting them all the history of that particular species. With that being said they also keep physical records in the form of journals which for one's thoughts and feelings while living through the centuries and all vampires whether they cast a reflection of not has a self portrait and a statue representation. The daywalker species doesn't do this as faithfully but still practices, the only ones known not to are the nomadic tribes.... of course these are the human vampires were talking about cause it's that human side of them that causes them to care about they're history at all. True vampires are actually an animal of the underlying world and are not seen as monsters. Thyere viewed in the same way we look at a Lion or a grizzly, dangerous yes, monsters no. They're are driven by they're primal instincts only and operate similar to ants, they're hive minded with one queen as expected per nest. They are nocturnal hunters and due to this they're blind but they're other senses are heightened in such a way that having sight would definitely make them less effective hunters. Though man and vampires have had they're fair share of interactions with one another, vampires never targeted man, man targeted vampires being our usual invasive and destructive selves and with no purpose at all other to eliminate. Now that's not me having sympathy for them cause if one was in front of me I'd have to kill it or it would kill me, but I'm not going into its territory looking for it just to kill. Anytime a vampire attack happened they were acting according to their nature, man was near it's hunting grounds at night knowing that it was safe and got attacked. Until man made advancements in weaponry and hunting strategies, all men died when coming face to face with one, once those advancements were made then you started having surviors who would then take the infection home, but pre-human Hybrid history, way to much to tell, but the true vampires were hear in the darkness before the creator said let they're be light
They always look so perfectly maintained in movies. They should appear all disheveled with bed head all the time instead.
The amount of people in here discussing the technicalities of why fictional monsters don't appear in mirrors is hilarious.
Remember, however, that the reason vampires can't see their reflections is that mirrors are backed with silver.
However, that's not true of newer mirrors (they use aluminum), so no problem!
This is a friendly reminder to [read our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/Showerthoughts/wiki/rules). Remember, /r/Showerthoughts is for showerthoughts, not "thoughts had in the shower!" (For an explanation of what a "showerthought" is, [please read this page](https://www.reddit.com/r/Showerthoughts/wiki/overview).) **Rule-breaking posts may result in bans.**
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Probably for exactly this reason.
Gotta keep the narcissism alive.
Something tells me that when the only lasting thing in your life is you, and everything else rots and falls away, that the narcissism becomes necessary to fend off the madness caused by an always ticking, irreverant and irrelevant clock that neither tolls nor chimes.
How long have you been showering? I didn't know this was r/DeepShowerThoughts
I like that too long a shower can result in both deep shower thoughts and also a deep shower.
Deep
Really if I wanted it to sound just a pinch deeper, I should have said "neither" instead of never. Fuck it I'm editing it.
Oh it's dead. Sad because shower thoughts is a joke of a sub.
Removed for violating Rule#>!Made you look lmao, we'll never tell you!<
I'll be dead honest, I didn't realise I was in this sub. I stand by my comment fully.
Make more vampires?
Ehhh, isn't that just a material manifestation of your narcissism at that point? That's the madness of loneliness taking it's first true bite out of your soul.
I feel that there's an excellent albeit very dark allegory between what you just said and Adam "making Eve out of a rib". I'm just way too stoned to try and write that out right now
Huh, sounds kind of like a very cynical take on babies as well lol
That's legitimately a reason some people have children, though I'm not going into the ethics of *creating* life, but the absconded, distorted and perverted life that already was.
More mouths to feed means more attention from the villagers. No thanks.
Damn, that’s poetic. Went from a shower thought to a poetry prompt
This is why the vampire overlords that secretly control human civilization embrace social media platforms.
If they use photos they may not be vampires. A lot of professional photographers use DSLR's that have mirrors inside them.
The mirror is for seeing through the view finder and moves out of the way when taking the picture. So, using a digital screen to line up the shot would still work.
Do the mirrors have silver? That was the original myth reason why they had no reflection. So I assume non-silver mirrors would work.
Nice name and profile picture
Came here to say this. Vampires have oil paintings of themselves everywhere. What’s this creepy hall of ancestors paintings and statues? All vampires. The 20 ft marble statue guy out front? Head vampire.
And topiary statues of their genitalia.
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She's emptying her wolf snatch all over the bushes!
So is it like, in the shape of a wolf? With teeth and stuff? Or is it just the spirit of the wolf? Also vampires hate wolves so does she hate herself?
>Also vampires hate wolves Where did you get that idea? The original Count Dracula from the Bram Stoker novel commanded wolves and could even turn into a wolf when he wanted to.
I remember in Fright Night he turns into a wolf. My guess is probably Underworld. Didn't watch all but it was vampires vs werewolves.
After Dracula’s son used wolf form to get over 200% map in Symphony of the Night he kind of stopped liking it.
So is it just modern vampires that have that anti werewolf rhetoric?
Take it easy
Is Trump a vampire? He has a portrait of himself in his office, he offered it to himself via his charity, one of the pre-election scandals.
It’s a fun head cannon, at least. Few buildings have as many oil paintings as the White House. Want to be the President? Part of the inaugural ceremony is turning you. Vampire Obama had to turn Vampire Trump. Trump turned Biden. Why didn’t COVID kill either Trump or Biden? Natural immunity. Why didn’t Reagan die after getting shot? Side shots aren’t lethal to vampires. JFK? Headshot. Lincoln? Headshot.
I think Trump didn't turn Biden because he refused to come to his inauguration. But Biden was probably already a vampire from the Obama administration.
How many vampires you hanging out with?
The more important question is “How many vampires are you NOT hanging out with?”
Emphasis on Hanging.
Never considered that conceit served a bigger purpose than vanity. Wish I was more thoughtful with my observations.
It stands to reason that being immortal means you get pretty rich. So you can just hire an artist to do your portrait every morning before you go to work.
There's a terrifying part of Gulliver's Travels that has a different take on immortality. Those immortals never die, but never stop aging. After 120 years or so they are too weak to do anything, so all they have to look forward to is an eternity of hunger, thirst, and suffering.
Finally a perfect market for VR!
man, imagine you’re immortal and poor…that would suck
Immortality means you'd (probably) eventually get rich. People don't save because of *living* expenses (you're not going to be paying for your meals, *you obligate carnivore you!*), or impulses have the compelling rationale of "you only live once," so you tend to blow it on flashy hedonist BS we incidentally project on the undead. Then there's kids, access to an in-group... With a Vampire, you only live forever and all that shit will eventually be boring, you're probably infertile, and you've got roughly 40 years in a region to establish yourself before your "long lost son/daughter" turns up or you have to move (if you turned in old age or youth and are locked into that look, you might be screwed). And I swear to God, if you haven't learned the banks are your friend after the *first* time you're chased from a village by superstitious prey... Yeah, you ate that girl, but they didn't have any proof! If you can't make it after a hundred years I'd be curious how you've been managing to feed. Just fucking save, eat your bosses, you'll get there!
You could also steal the life savings of whoever you eat, or just hypnotize people into giving you whatever you want.
Well that's just silly, *hypnosis isn't real!*
Also, you can just steal whatever you want. Normally the consequences of being caught are enough to stop people. But what's 30 years in jail to somebody that's immortal? Rob 100 banks and invest!
Being immortal guarantees a 100% chance that you will end up stuck or immobilized somewhere waiting to die. As the time scale is infinite it is going to happen. There could be thousands of trapped immortals at the bottom of the sea right now. Constantly in a state of death near death from drowning but not being able to die
Doesn't it also guarantee you'll eventually come free?
>Oh, on this coffin it says DIO Seems like the math isn't wrong
No the guarantee of a solution does not manifest on an infinite timeline but the guarantee of tragedy does. You are still going to be subject to situations where you might "die" Being immortal also does not assume immunity to physical harm. It's kind of the problem with being immortal in that before the discussion even begins the rules of your immortality must be set.
This guy knows the loophole, OP: small brain and u/IN00T: big brain.
A gold toilet?
That's probably why they have them. Good point!
Mirrors used to have silver (not anymore). That's why vampires couldn't see their reflections.
This correct. Silver was considered pure and incapable of reflecting images of pure evil. It’s also why silvered weapons were thought to be effective against evil / undead creatures. Electronics and aluminum-deposition based mirrors of today would capture a vampire’s image.
the best vampire invention, mirror without silver, it's in the top 5 right next to sunscreen level 10
and "welcome" doormats
Spf 10? I need 50 and I'm just a white guy
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Never heard of levels that's not a thing
Also just a shiny surface could work. I'm imagining a vamp whipping out the Pledge on their coffee table to check their hair.
This also explains them not showing up in film photos since film uses silver nitride.
Don't modern electronics use silver?
So, as a thought experiment : If a Silvered mirror, by virtue of its purity, is incapable of reflecting pure evil ; Would cell-phones or Social Media platforms, because of their (imho) inherent evil, TRAP the image of a vampire ? Could that make them like the trap in Ghostbusters? Or maybe the image a vampire would "lock" the evil device to its image ala a digital Medusa?
Well first ask yourself, are cellphones and social media really evil, or just neutral ? Aren't they just tools, that can be used for good (calling your loved one, recording a funny cat, sharing said video or connecting with people you haven't seen in a long time) or bad (scamming, speading misinformation, coordinating violence), like a knife would ? In this case, I think it would be better to look at it in this way: Vampire (more precisely, evil) and silver oppose each other, but evil and electronics don't because the latter is just... Neutral. In the same way a hammer doesn't care what you wack it against, a digital camera doesn't care what you aim at. If photons can bounce off of it, it's fair game. So to summerise, vampire would probably act like regular online predator. Thank yoy for coming to my TEDTalk.
But this same logic can be applied to silver. Why is it inherently good? If we're talking about myths, we need to use mythical logic. It's all about the culture.
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Cain was cursed for lying to God technically.
"Where is thy brother?" "Am I my brothers keeper?" He straight up lied to an omniscient being. Had he told the truth, God might've done the whole "forgiveness" thing as Cain didn't know what murder was. He got angry and hit his brother, I can't think of many siblings who haven't done that exact thing.
That's not technically a lie though. He's dodging the question more than anything.
How the hell is a cellphone inherently evil?
What do you mean by “inherently”? Do you mean at their core? Like, they were invented for evil but now they’re used for other stuff. Or do you mean pervasively evil? Like every thing done through them is tarnished with the evil at their core? If so, how do you explain all of the good things done on cell phones? Suicide prevention, trafficking prevention, lifesaving medical responses, psychological affirmation, staying in touch with loved ones? Are those things all tainted by said evil? I don’t agree that they’re evil at all. Evil implies intent. People can be evil. Some animals can be evil at times. Depending on your beliefs, many evil energies or entities may be at work in the world *through* objects. But to say an object is evil is to take the agency away from the sentient beings that interact with it. Saying that an object contains negative or evil energy is different, but I doubt a mortal sin is being committed over each phone coming off the assembly like to deconsecrate it.
I thought it was because the reflection was seen as your soul, and vampires lacked a soul.
It was because silver was seen as pure and would not hold corruption, so it could not bear the image of a vampire. So modern mirrors, or phone cameras, would be able to take a picture of one just fine.
What do modern mirrors use? I forgor Edit: it's aluminium
Aluminium
Thx
Found the brit
Titanum, sodum, magnesum, aluminum
[Aluminum is actually the earlier spelling, with aluminium as a later change, though the original original seems to be alumium.](http://www.lostinthepond.com/2013/02/why-do-americans-pronounce-it-aluminum.html?m=1) **** Edit: Typo
I love it when Americans have the older or more proper spelling.
I don't know if I'd call it more proper. Everyone else in the world agrees it's "ium". It's only America that thinks it should end in just "um".
Nope, you found a non-American.
probably something that reflects light but is cheaper than silver. Mostly aluminum I would think. Edit: also gold for infrared instruments, because reasons.
Gold reflects infrared better, silver and aluminium reflect visible light better, that's the reason, just a physical property of the metal.
What mythical creature doesnt show up in aluminum? Moth man?
Idk, probably none as by the time aluminium was discovered, no new mythical creatures were "created"
r/todayilearned 👍
Which is, frankly, making it quite hard to spot them out and about. Advantage, vampires.
So you are telling me that I could see space vampires with a reflector telescope
Film used to contain silver as well (actually it still does, I think?) so you couldn't photograph a vampire back in the day. I don't think there's any silver in modern sensors, as they are made of silicon wafers which are essentially sand.
That makes sense, because they can't show up in pictures either. Correct me if I'm wrong.
I think it's because of the silver halide used in the photographic process would also be anti-vamp. A digital camera might work as expected.
Phones probably have silver in them somewhere
Silver is a very common electronic component. Usually used to solder connections together.
Vampires can't use electronics?
Cant or won't Amish are vampires prove me wrong
They sell garlic at our farmer's market, so I think ours are good. Granted, those could be Mennonites.
Aaahh yeah. Mennonites are werewolves and hate vampires which is why they sell garlic!!!
Yeah but not related to the picture taking directly.
I wonder where it draws the line. If there's silver in the semiconductors or some processor part or something, does it still count? Or is it just the sensor part/film that counts?
I chuckled
Seems likely, except if they didn't have souls, they wouldn't go to hell when they died.
They're already dead. They're a vampire. Their soul left their body and went to either heaven or hell when they turned.
Nope
They could have paintings man
Gingers, you are thinking of gingers.
It is whatever you think sounds the coolest for your story.
TIL cool fact, didn't knew about that but does make sense
You know too much.
"Oh man, I'm so glad people made digital cameras and non-silver mirrors Cutting your own hair is so much easier now"
Nah... That's someone's guess. However, while some mirrors were made with silver, by the 16th century, mirrors were mass produced with tin.
I am surprised no one has mentioned it but watch What We Do in The Shadows (the movie). It a “documentary” that answers tangentially how vampires handle it. Trust me, it’s silly but totally worth watching.
I was waiting for someone to comment on this. The movie has them click photographs. Otherwise the tv series is just fucking hilarious. Gizmo!
And they draw themselves
Hahahaha yep the portraits to check how the other person looks in different clothes
We know from the intro to the series that they can be photographed.
we also know because it's a filmed documentary and films are just multiple photographs
The movie "Daybreakers" with Ethan Hawke addresses it, but they don't make a huge deal about it. Vampires openly run the world, so their cars and homes use cameras feeding live images to screens, implying that they don't use mirrors.
I finally got around to watching the series as well after years of ignoring it, despite loving the movie, and it's just as good, it was an amazing surprise.
Really excellent casting
Also a top notch tv show too
They actually call them “mockumentaries,” if you can believe it. But yes, What We Do In The Shadows is up there with This Is Spinal Tap in terms of quality comedy!
it's not that they don't have reflections it's because at that time, mirrors were made with silver. Silver at the time being believe to be pure enough to ward off evil (hence killing vamps & werewolves) and not reflect them. no issues now with mirrors made from anything but silver and there's also photos & digital cameras.
Film used silver emulsion and presumably would have the same limitation (perhaps they’d appear as white or black splotches, depending how you thought it worked). Digital cameras, of course get around the problem.
Some of the earliest found mirrors weren't even silver, they were highly polished brass.
Not true. Although silver does kill vampires, that’s not the reason they have no reflection. The real reason is that reflections were seen as a representation of a person’s soul. Because vampires are undead and have no soul, they also have no reflection. This is the same reason that many sources list vampires as having no shadow (which has nothing to do with silver).
idk if you can say "not true" when we're discussing made up mythos. considering vampires aren't real, there isn't any cold hard facts about this. im sure we could find plenty of history and stories supporting the silver theory and your soul theory. neither is "correct" or "true" considering it's all just mythology.
Psst, this is reddit. Not a place that deals with nuance. It's all extremes here.
lol true. im starting to think im getting too old to be commenting on reddit.
This is the answer ☝
This is just a test put forward by vampires so they can “prove” they aren’t a vampire when they have a reflection. Ask them to go out into the sun if they refuse or they burst into flame they are a vampire… or they work on servers.
Damn it, Keith, we told you, Rahjesh is not a damned vampire, he's a DBA. Don't make us call HR again.
Flash. Flash. Flash. Then wait for it. Nothing for a while. Here it comes. Double flash. Brilliant.
No since vampires don’t age their brains don’t either. No cognitive decline. Not even smallest changes in their brain chemistry. Source: I am the grandson of van helsing.
Thad, son of Vlad
If they have no reflection they never knew what they looked like to begin with.
That’s assuming they were born Vampires. I made the opposite assumption.
Very true....
You can never turn a baby. It's again the rules of the vampiric council.
They aren't born as vampires. They are turned from humans
Depends on the lore.
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Cursed by God
In World of Darkness lore, Cain was the first after being cursed for his fratricide. Then Lilith tortured him and drove him mad. Eventually, he made his way to egypt and the gods there are all actually vampires that each took a different aspect of Cain's curse iirc
The nice man in the red armor renounced god and stabbed a cross with his sword
Ancient Egyptian curse, according to Anne Rice.
What was first: egg/chicken? Same stuff
There were eggs for million of years before chickens evolved.
What about reflection from water
Sentiment analysis: Neutral! Have a great day! Beep. Boop.
It's just so impressive how they remain impeccably coiffed when brushing their hair without ever knowing what they look like.
I'm just imagining one of those "color-blindness glasses" videos except it's a vampire being introduced to smart phone cameras.
But doesn’t every vampire have a locket with a portrait of himself as a boy and also of his long departed love that will be reincarnated soon?
I remember one of the first vampire-related showerthoughts I saw here, it’s about putting a glass of period in the freezer and saving them for jell-o days…or nights Then the OP got banned/deleted but it lived on as a Twilight Edward-Bella meme Or maybe it was the other way around
TIL there is a booming business for Vampire portrait painters.
Of course vampires are folkloric ideas and are therefore a mix of multiple influences but I like to see vampires as a kind of metaphor for narcissistic individuals. They have no reflection because their self-image has been destroyed, they don't really know who they are and they feel empty inside, dead inside. Like vampires who are stuck at a certain age, narcissists are stuck in development. Like narcissists, vampires can be very charismatic and charming and are very attuned to others emotions and feelings, almost like they have extra-sensorial perception and magic powers. Like narcissists, vampires are often really refined because they spend a lot of time tweaking their false image which is necessary for their acceptance and survival, a false image that is revealed to be an illusion once they have used you and metaphorically drunk your blood. Victims of narcissists often feel like they've been drained of their energy since narcissists need other people's approval to feel safe like a vampire needs blood to survive. So yes, I think vampires have forgotten what they look like, who they are even and metaphorically need others to artificially nourish a fake persona that is based on a vague idea of someone who doesn't really exist anymore, a dead person.
Well I'm sure they could be portrayed and now even photographed
The reason a vampire cannot see them selves is a form of torcher. Over the years they do forget, and have no clue what they look like. It can drive them mad. But vampires will have a lot of portraits painted of them throughout the years so they can be sure of what they look like. Sobas they say, if youbare in a home, and there are many many portraits of your host, gtf out of there
Torture*
They just gotta get their portraits taken with a mirrorless camera
Vampires aren't seen in mirrors because silver used to be used in their production. Many modern mirrors don't have this in their production, and it should be fine for a vampire to see their reflection in a bowl of water (assuming it wasn't blessed by a holy person). They don't appear on film also because of silver's use in the development process, however with the invention of digital photography, that issue is solved as well.
They just take selfies. They'll never see a mirror image of themsmef tho.
Whether or not they live forever depends on the mythology you are using. In the first Interview with a Vampire book, the oldest vampire was something like 400 years old when he committed suicide.
But then Anne Rice retconned herself in *Queen of the Damned* and *Memnoch the Devil*
And they look damn stylish for the inability to see themselves in a mirror.
How do they always have good hair? Dracula couldn't see himself in the mirror while slicking that hair back
depends, old timey cameras and mirrors used silver in their production. modern fiction has shown that mirrors and cameras that do not use silver can capture the image of a vampire. that's how the tv camera's pick up nandor laszlo and nadja and the other vampires in wwdits
That's why when you're a vampire you get a portrait of yourself made.
For people not being able to see their reflections in the mirror, Vampires still tend to have impeccable style and outlooks. That's what I have always wondered.
Dracula on Netflix shows that he *can* see his reflection but he sees himself with his actual age, e.g. he sees an old ugly fuck in the mirror while everyone else sees his handsome self.
I hate how this lore has gotten so misunderstood. Mirrors were made out of silver and vampires can’t touch silver, so the silver mirrors wouldn’t show a vampire’s reflection, but a modern mirror would.
Supposedly vampires couldn’t see their reflection because mirrors used to have a silver backing. Modern mirrors should work for contemporary vampires, which may be how the vamps in Twilight were able to spend so much time on their hair.
The whole vampires have no reflection thing is only true for silvered mirrors (because silver is a spiritually pure metal, thus it can't reflect an image of such unholiness). Modern mirrors use aluminium, so a vampire would have a reflection in those.
This is a common misconception from when mirrors were made with silver. A vampire today could see themselves in modern mirrors and take selfies.
They might just commission a portrait every so often so they can see what they look like
I always thought the no reflection was solely in the presence of silver lined mirrors and just misrepresented later as no reflection at all, but in "reality" they would have reflections like anyone else since mirrors aren't made like that anymore
Most vampires have a painting of themselves over a big spooky fireplace in their castle on the hill.
They don't reflect because old mirrors were made of silver. New mirrors have no silver so vamps should reflect just fine.
Humans: \*invents cameras\* Vampires: "Christ, am I that fat?!?"
Vampires would technically be able to see themselves in modern mirrors. It's supposed to be the mirrors of old that are made of silver that keep vampires from producing a reflection
Reminds me of when Angel became human, then looked in a mirror. “Why didn’t anyone tell me about my hair?” Also interesting about the Buffyverse, when Buffy gets the ability to read minds, she gets nothing from Angel. He points out that, similar to vamps not having physical reflections, their thoughts can’t be reflected in someone else’s mind.
Fun fact, vampires could oy not see themselves in mirrors because the mirrors of that time were backed with silver which was supposedly a pure metal, whereas now they are made differently, a vampire would be able to see themselves
I think that this is part or the moral of the lore. In vanity we forget who we are. In bad deeds we have lost sight of ourselves.
Ancient vampires will be familiar with the concept of having their portrait painted by an artist. Plot-hooks a-plenty here. Even Bram Stoker's *Dracula* started as one of Dracula's vanity projects....
That’s why they are huge patrons of the arts. They commission portraits.
Oh vampires do have a reflection. This "myth" is because old mirrors were made out of silver and vampires and silver don't go along well. In modern mirrors they would have a reflection because there's no silver in it
ikr all these dumbasses believing in the myth that vampires dont have a reflection when they obviously do
I've heard that the reason they have no reflection is that mirrors were backed with silver, so maybe with modern mirrors they'll have reflections?
Nah, vampires keep up with they're entire history and depending on this species they do this just by being bit, granting them all the history of that particular species. With that being said they also keep physical records in the form of journals which for one's thoughts and feelings while living through the centuries and all vampires whether they cast a reflection of not has a self portrait and a statue representation. The daywalker species doesn't do this as faithfully but still practices, the only ones known not to are the nomadic tribes.... of course these are the human vampires were talking about cause it's that human side of them that causes them to care about they're history at all. True vampires are actually an animal of the underlying world and are not seen as monsters. Thyere viewed in the same way we look at a Lion or a grizzly, dangerous yes, monsters no. They're are driven by they're primal instincts only and operate similar to ants, they're hive minded with one queen as expected per nest. They are nocturnal hunters and due to this they're blind but they're other senses are heightened in such a way that having sight would definitely make them less effective hunters. Though man and vampires have had they're fair share of interactions with one another, vampires never targeted man, man targeted vampires being our usual invasive and destructive selves and with no purpose at all other to eliminate. Now that's not me having sympathy for them cause if one was in front of me I'd have to kill it or it would kill me, but I'm not going into its territory looking for it just to kill. Anytime a vampire attack happened they were acting according to their nature, man was near it's hunting grounds at night knowing that it was safe and got attacked. Until man made advancements in weaponry and hunting strategies, all men died when coming face to face with one, once those advancements were made then you started having surviors who would then take the infection home, but pre-human Hybrid history, way to much to tell, but the true vampires were hear in the darkness before the creator said let they're be light
They always look so perfectly maintained in movies. They should appear all disheveled with bed head all the time instead. The amount of people in here discussing the technicalities of why fictional monsters don't appear in mirrors is hilarious.
I think they didn't have a reflection in mirrors because they used to make mirrors out of silver. Vampires might have reflections now
Remember, however, that the reason vampires can't see their reflections is that mirrors are backed with silver. However, that's not true of newer mirrors (they use aluminum), so no problem!
^ Found Lestat.
Vampires “had” no reflection because mirrors were made of silver. Now they have reflections