Question: In conversation, when someone says they appreciate my brain, I need an effective comeback. I was going to say:

> 
> "I hope that you are not turning into a zombie with your love for my brain."
> 
> 
> 

But I feel that *"turning into"* is not a sufficiently **vivid** verb to use.

What verb should I use when someone turns into (or possibly might turn into) a zombie?

I want the verb to tell a bit of the story by describing the what and why of zombies.

Answer: 
A more vivid verb that describes the what and why of zombies. Ambitious!

O.K. How about **transmute**? That hasn't been suggested by anyone yet. 

Looking into the history of transmutation, I discovered that the word was used in the 19th century several years before the advent of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution: *On The Origin of Species* in 1859. Previously to that, it had been adopted by alchemists to describe the transformation of ordinary metal into gold. The promoter of the transmutation theory, the Frenchman, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck and author of *Philosophie Zoologique* (1809) claimed...

> 
> that simple forms of life were created continuously by
>  *spontaneous generation*. He also believed that an innate life force,
>  which he sometimes described as a nervous fluid, **drove species to
>  become more complex over time**, advancing up a linear ladder of
>  complexity that was related to the great chain of being.
> 
> 
> 

[Online Etymology](http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=transmute) has this to say

*(v.) early 15c., from Latin transmutare, "change from one condition to another,"from trans-"thoroughly" + mutare "to change" Related: Transmuted; transmuting*
Why, when you tell me, "I love you for your brain." Do I only feel fear? Fear, like, seriously? Have you undergone zombification[1]? 

[1] <http://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2012/10/zombies-voodoo-and-pufferfish.html>