Use of いる and ある when referring to corpses

[killuaDev]

So I was wondering when discussing a museum I went to with some of my friends, are corpses referred to with the verb ある? And does that hold true for things like mummies or to a greater extent zombies?

[Kumirei]

I would assume it depends on animation, so if it’s a walking corpse or mummy it would be いる and otherwise ある, but I don’t remember hearing any conversation about mummies or zombies in Japanese. I could very well be wrong

[YukiPhoenix]

According to the Maggie Sensei post about いる and ある:

http://maggiesensei.com/2010/01/15/いる＋ある-iru-aru-request-lesson/

There is was this post in the comments:

When someone you know or loving pets die and talk about their body, you use いる
おばあちゃんは隣の部屋にいる and treat them as if they are alive with respect. If you say ある, it sounds really cold and you may offend their family.

Now, if you treat them as a dead body you say 死体 (dead body: sounds very cold if you use it for someone you know. You hear that on news), then you use ある (We say 死体を発見した= We found a dead body more though) but when you use ご遺体 (goitai: more polite than 死体), you use 置かれる / 安置する or we even use 眠っている /横たわっている (sleeping/lying)

I you found a dead animal , just saying (animal) がある is strange.
You say あそこに死んだ(animal) がいる
or
(animal) の死体がある

http://maggiesensei.com/2010/01/15/いる＋ある-iru-aru-request-lesson/#comment-64422

[killuaDev]

Some of my friends and I did come up with the idea that it could be contextual, that’s really interesting!

[auruille]

That’s a really good question actually, I never thought of that! Now I’ve learned something new.

[nfpuleo]

Same, really clever topic. Never occurred to me before.