I was once asked about my work at a party only to have a total stranger interrupt and announce, “Oh, you study freaks.” Debating with ignorant people is a frustrating task. There is a special place in heaven for those who can do this without losing their patience. To say that, “vampires don’t exist,” is patently absurd. As a social reality, vampires absolutely exist. It really doesn’t matter whether their claims will ever be confirmed by science. Geneticists argue over whether the concept of “race” has any scientific basis, but this hardly means that the privileges and prejudices associated with race will go away if we simply pretend that “race” doesn’t exist.

Similarly, to say that, “it’s all in their head,” is an unwarranted dismissal that illuminates noting. In the 17th century, the philosopher René Descartes showed that the reality “in our heads” is the only reality we have. I could hit a man with my car and tell him, “You aren’t really hurt, it’s all in your head.” At that point, it would be my subjective experience against his. With further evidence—testimony from witnesses, x-rays, etc., we might safely conclude that the accident victim’s version of events was correct, and mine was wrong. With vampires, we are only beginning to collect this kind of evidence. We don’t even know what kind of evidence would be needed to support or refute the experiences that vampires are describing. Ultimately, we can never experience anyone else’s reality, so it is highly presumptuous to pass judgment on experiences that we are not privy to.

This is not to say that whenever I do research, I take everything the subject says at face value. However, we have to maintain what is sometimes called “epistemological modesty.” This means acknowledging that even when we are skeptical of someone else’s worldview, we must be open to the possibility that we might be wrong and they might actually be right.

Joseph Laycock, “Vampires Today: The Truth about Vampires”