Quid pro quo

[floo]

deleted

[Harrowby Hall]

Hasn't it already been done?

My memory fails me at the moment, but is there not a sect in the Indian subcontinent who take (or at least took) their dead up to the top of high towers to be consumed by vultures?


.... And then there is also the story (possibly dubious) that when Lord Lucan threw himself into the arms of his gambling friends and asked for help, he was killed for not honouring his gambling debts and fed to the carnivores of Longleat ...

[Nearly Sane]

Hasn't it already been done?

My memory fails me at the moment, but is there not a sect in the Indian subcontinent who take (or at least took) their dead up to the top of high towers to be consumed by vultures?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsi

Though

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2015/04/vultures-fate-parsi-sky-burials-uncertain-150401063720435.html

[Owlswing]

Hasn't it already been done?

My memory fails me at the moment, but is there not a sect in the Indian subcontinent who take (or at least took) their dead up to the top of high towers to be consumed by vultures?

I always thought that it was some of the Native American tribes that did this.

[ekim]

It would probably contravene all sorts of disease prevention regulations, better to be buried in a hole and have a tree planted over you.

[Udayana]

Worms and maggots need food too!

I think quite a lot of animals would be poisoned by human meat full of drugs and antibiotics.

[Shaker]

Agreed. Burial is a luxury that, increasingly, graveyards and cemeteries can no longer afford.

[Owlswing]

Agreed. Burial is a luxury that, increasingly, graveyards and cemeteries can no longer afford.

Agreed.

I have already made provision that I am to be cremated and my ashes will be taken to the top of Glastonbury Tor on the birthday immediately following my death and my daughters, my High Priestess and my daughter-in-law will cast my ashes to the four winds at midnight.

Even my son, who is, without doubt the most complete atheist ever born, has agreed to take part.

I am have been trying to write the ritual that will be used for this event for about two years. I just hope the Goddess allows me to live long enough to finish it!.

[Owlswing]

The graveyards around here are bursting at the seams, and keep having to acquire extra land for burials, which could be put to much better use, imo.

Especially when churches are being deconsecrated and sold for conversion into luxury homes for people with more money than sense, and the graves, and, where possible, their contents, are having ti be re-located.

[john]

I've instructed my wife to chop me up into bits and put a couple of bits a week into the dustbin to save money.

I thinks she's looking forward to it!

[Gonnagle]

Dear Floo,

Donate your body to medical science, according to my oldest brother you can do it online, lots of medical students chopping up your body for free, well I think it is free

Gonnagle.

[ippy]

Body donation for medical students, or transplant my bod's not going to be a lot of use to me when I'm diedeaded.

ippy

[Owlswing]

I've instructed my wife to chop me up into bits and put a couple of bits a week into the dustbin to save money.

I thinks she's looking forward to it!

Round my way she would get fined £ 1,000 for putting food waste into the wrong bin!

[Owlswing]

We have looked into that idea, which is a good one, but it isn't apparently as straight forward as it seems. However we are still considering it for both my husband and myself.

I regret that your husband, taking into account his recent medical history, is unlikely to be accepted except in specialised and specific investigations into such medical histories.

This according to my ex-wife who works with a couple of specialists who "work with body donations and the acceptance of offers thereof". Her words noit mine!

[ippy]

We have looked into that idea, which is a good one, but it isn't apparently as straight forward as it seems. However we are still considering it for both my husband and myself.

My bod's going to Sheffield Uni, where my bro got his MD, go for Sheffield Floo, their'll take any body, I don't know about Welsh Irish mixes though.

ippy

[ippy]

I have no Welsh in me.

They are fussy.

ippy

[jeremyp]

I've instructed my wife to chop me up into bits and put a couple of bits a week into the dustbin to save money.

I thinks she's looking forward to it!

Did you make it very clear she is not to start before your death?

[Brownie]

That is what we suspected. I offered to chop him up myself and feed him to the neighbourhood dogs of which there are many.

Ah, but what will happen when the dogs find they like human flesh and crave more?  Previously charming pets - and some less charming - will form a pack that ventures out under the cover of darkness to hunt stray humans....I feel a novel coming on.

I couldn't care less what happens to my body when I'm dead, I won't be around so it won't matter.  To be disposed of quickly, efficiently, economically and quietly is all I ask.

[Harrowby Hall]

Does human flesh taste any different to any other red meat?

More like pork than beef ...


...... so I'm told!

[Brownie]

Does human flesh taste any different to any other red meat?

HH says it tastes like pork.  I have never tried it but imagine it would be considered a special delicacy by a pack of dogs who, once initiated, would crave human flesh forever. No-one would ever again be able to stand at a 'bus stop alone at night, cars and houses would be reinforced.

Polar bears are fond of human flesh, they are the only bears who actually hunt humans.  David Attenborough said that (about the polar bears, not the dogs.  I said about the dogs).

[Sassy]

We eat animals of other species, so why shouldn't they eat the human animal when we die?

If it wouldn't poison the poor things I don't see a problem with people being able to request their mortal remains should be fed to zoo/safari park animals when they die. This could be an option alongside burial, cremation, or being chopped up by medical students. I would be more than happy to be of some use when I kick the bucket.

What do others think?

So as a Zoo caretaker you think psychologically that they would be happy feeding the dead remains of a child to an animal.
Your sick....

What is more, I cannot believe anyone actually gave the post the time of day. It is immoral and sick to suggest.

[Owlswing]

Unless you are a veggie, you eat animals so what is wrong with eating the human animal?

Cannibalism, which is what you appear to be advocating is, to my mind, toitally unacceptable under any circumstances. I know there have been supposed cases of it after disasters of various forms, but even then its acceptability is highly questionable.

The fact the the human bodies mentioned so far in thgis discussion have all been adults makes Sassy's introduction of te bodies of children nothing more than a ploy to allow her to make herself look righteous and you otherwise.   

[Brownie]

Bovine spongiform encephalopathy was caused by feeding parts of cattle to cattle, a form of cannibalism.  What is suggested here is not cannibalism but it is highly likely that a similar disease could be transmitted to the animals and then on to humans who eat the animals.  It's really not worth the effort, it isn't as if there is not sufficient animal feed already.  That's apart from the aesthetics, what Sassy said about the remains of a child being fed to an animal struck home with me - I certainly didn't think she said it with any agenda to show herself as superior, it wasn't a calculated remark but seemed to me to be spontaneous, from the heart. 

If we start hardening ourselves too much, saying,  "Well, they are dead, they won't know, won't feel", etc, all of which are true, we are shutting off a part of our humanity.

We've had a bit of a laugh about this but, being serious, I don't believe it should happen, nor do I think it will.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Just by way of a thought experiment, if super advanced aliens landed tomorrow whose development was in the same relationship to us as ours is to, say, pigs and they started farming us for food would we have a legitimate ethical objection - or perhaps an ethical objection more legitimate than that to which pigs are entitled wen we farm them?

If "yes", then why?

(I speak as a carnivore by the way, but I don't have a good answer to that.)

[Nearly Sane]

Just by way of a thought experiment, if super advanced aliens landed tomorrow whose development was in the same relationship to us as ours is to, say, pigs and they started farming us for food would we have a legitimate ethical objection - or perhaps an ethical objection more legitimate than that to which pigs are entitled wen we farm them?

If "yes", then why?

(I speak as a carnivore by the way, but I don't have a good answer to that.)

All arguments around this would comprise of some qualitative line that one draws. One could define us as having some special form of sentience and awareness but you would need something a bit more structured than Alan Burns' we can read books, of Sassy's 'I am not an animal approach'. Even with that it's an arbitrary line that the aliens may not agree with though they may find some of us cute as we unthinking react.

Maybe some of them will argue that there ethical objections to eating us, and keep us around to stroke and laugh at how we react to watching Game of Thrones. Of course not wanting too many of us, the males would get spayed as it also stops them fighting.