I believe Charlton Heston said it best: "Soylent Green is people; it's made of people...". I'm sure this doesn't put us on the path to anything like that though, right? Right??
4
It's human nature, I suppose, to sentimentalize dead bodies.
Many countries in the world deal with the issue of space and dead bodies in their own ways - stacking, disinterring, cremating after so many years. America, because it is so big hasn't had to focus really, on what to do with millions of corpses. Now, we may be forced to.
And yes, fillings have to come out of teeth, pacemakers have to be removed, metal plates, artificial joints - anything not natural will not compost. It has nothing to do with respecting the living person. It has to do with a practical solution to a growing problem.
I worked in the funeral industry for a few years and the fear that so many people have surrounding what happens to the body after they die surprised me at first. I participated in more than one disinterment - there are many reasons for this - and we always had to view the remains. If you think your body turns into a nice dusty, bony presence after a few decades, let me assure you that embalming makes for a really, unappetizing mess.
People do not want to hear this and in fact, buy caskets with locks and gaskets to keep out..what? All of the mess is in us already. A casket just keeps us floating around in it for many, many decades.
I would much rather be part of the earth, the rain, the wind and participate in the glory of the wonderful planet we live on than we burned or worse to me, buried.
People need to educate themselves.
Many countries in the world deal with the issue of space and dead bodies in their own ways - stacking, disinterring, cremating after so many years. America, because it is so big hasn't had to focus really, on what to do with millions of corpses. Now, we may be forced to.
And yes, fillings have to come out of teeth, pacemakers have to be removed, metal plates, artificial joints - anything not natural will not compost. It has nothing to do with respecting the living person. It has to do with a practical solution to a growing problem.
I worked in the funeral industry for a few years and the fear that so many people have surrounding what happens to the body after they die surprised me at first. I participated in more than one disinterment - there are many reasons for this - and we always had to view the remains. If you think your body turns into a nice dusty, bony presence after a few decades, let me assure you that embalming makes for a really, unappetizing mess.
People do not want to hear this and in fact, buy caskets with locks and gaskets to keep out..what? All of the mess is in us already. A casket just keeps us floating around in it for many, many decades.
I would much rather be part of the earth, the rain, the wind and participate in the glory of the wonderful planet we live on than we burned or worse to me, buried.
People need to educate themselves.
32
You go girl. This is an excellent idea! I want to opt for it.
14
This article begs the question "what kind of plants would we get if we composted certain people?" I'd hate to think what would come up if we composted some of my past co-workers and landlords - perish the thought!!!
2
Its been discovered that traditional cemeteries are 'teeming with greenhouse gases!' I worry that a careless sextant will stick a trident or shovel in the ground, piercing the hat boxes holding my parents' composting remains while their 'precious bodily fluids' are still making their peace with the earth, sending lethal shock waves of greenhouse gases cascading into the remaining breathable atmosphere! The situation is so dire, I'm afraid to die myself, letting loose a veritable 'death perfume' of noxious, unbreathable fumes into the small part of the ionosphere from which one can still draw a breathable cusp of air!
1
Yes, we can talk about the details of handling the bodies, but please keep the cemeteries and the marker stones. These are our links to the past and important reminders of those who lived before us. Historians and genealogists appreciate cemeteries.
Think of the magic in native American cemeteries. Consider the depth of understanding involved in walking through a Jewish cemetery in a town where Jews no longer live.
Yes, we'll have to think about cemetery planning. It would seem that a square mile of cemetery would hold (only) about a quarter-million graves. But let's start that planning.
Think of the magic in native American cemeteries. Consider the depth of understanding involved in walking through a Jewish cemetery in a town where Jews no longer live.
Yes, we'll have to think about cemetery planning. It would seem that a square mile of cemetery would hold (only) about a quarter-million graves. But let's start that planning.
9
What kind of a future are we being ushered toward? Today Green Burial, tomorrow Soylent Green? Sign me up for the burial thing anyway.
3
Embalming and sealing in an Earth-proof vault seems like something that will eventually be a weird anachronism to future generations. Besides the unnatural aspect of embalming and burial, there is another issue. Humans are an increasingly mobile tribe. Generations past often settled and then stayed in one place, but today's nuclear family often has 2 or more places they will call "home", often hundreds of miles apart. What good - as a memorial anyway - is a fixed burial spot, such as a grave or mausoleum, if the loved ones left behind cannot reasonably ever get there to tend to it, plant a flower, pay respects, ponder past joys and sorrows, weep or just sit quietly and remember?
11
India's Parsis already compost their dead. They feed their dead to Vultures, Kites and Crows in the belief that is the only way their ancestors will go to heaven. Maybe there is something to learn from one of the oldest surviving religions on earth.
http://www.npr.org/2012/09/05/160401322/vanishing-vultures-a-grave-matte...
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/30/world/asia/cultivating-vultures-to-res...
http://www.npr.org/2012/09/05/160401322/vanishing-vultures-a-grave-matte...
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/30/world/asia/cultivating-vultures-to-res...
8
I was excited to read this article (especially from my state of conservative politics and Bible-Belt morals) which eschews the idea that a living loved one or relative has eternal connection and reverence assigned to their physical body. I, myself, have arranged for cadaver donation so that a medical student might better understand the human body when they venture out to help the living. But I was really elated when I started reading the comments here and found that most of them, especially the reader picks, were not only supportive, but respectful and celebrate the contributions that we can give from birth through our return to the earth....for those who are religious, "from dust to dust...". Kudos to Ms. Spade, and my great respect to those who truly respect that we are mere visitors on our planet, and have an obligation to future generations to plan our demise in a way that will preserve the third planet from the sun.
41
A friend of mine lives on an old Hollywood dude ranch in the Mojave Desert. It had its own graveyard; I don't know how many bodies are buried there. But in that graveyard there are fantastic mature peach trees that produce sweet and succulent organic peaches. Question: Would you eat those peaches?
7
The article, all too predictably pushing this procedure, touches only briefly on the drawbacks. Most Americans over 55 have dental fillings sometimes made of stuff that doesn't decay but pollutes. Some have metal implants. Some have toxic tissues from medical treatments or pharmaceuticals. At least the traditional means of either cremation or isolation in a vault enclosed box of metal or wood minimizes the pollution potential to groundwater.
5
We could simply return to our ancestors ritual of cleaning, wrapping in a shroud and laying in the ground. Time and nature would take it from there. Simple, peaceful, cycle of life. Whole families, multiple generations could be laid to rest in a very small plot of earth.
8
Lets see, pickled and contained in a box, burned and pulverized then either kept in a jar, dumped in a salt flat as crab food which are then eaten by fine diners everywhere and turned into excrement or composted and reused as nourishment for trees.... I think I like the compost aspect...... hey the Indians (yes, Indians- Abenaki | Eastern Pequot Nation | Golden Hill Paugussett Indian Tribe | Haudenosaunee Confederacy | Maliseet Indians | Mashantucket Pequot Nation | Mi’kmaq Indians | Mohegan Tribe | Narragansett Indian Tribe | Nipmuc Nation | Passamaquoddy Tribes of Maine | Penobscot Nation | Schaghticoke Tribal Nation | Shinnecock Indian Nation | Unkechaug | Wampanoag ) used to bury fish under seed corn - whats the difference? They knew that once a living organism becomes a shell and starts to decompose, it had use that went beyond its lifespan.
Use me to fertilize an apple tree, then every year make some cider, let it get a little hard and tip a cup or two - as my guest.
Use me to fertilize an apple tree, then every year make some cider, let it get a little hard and tip a cup or two - as my guest.
13
I would stipulate this in a minute if such a facility were available in the Bay Area. Otherwise I am opting for cremation after donation to a medical school.
7
There was a time when nonbalmed bodies were placed in coffins made of wood, lowered into unlined graves, and cemeteries allowed coffins to be placed on top of one another. I recently attended a funeral where the family bought a stunning pine coffin made by Trappist Monks for their loved one. The price was considerably less than conventional coffins, and it was what the deceased had requested. That's what I want. My family and I will be looking into finding a cemetery that does not require a vault.
5
In cold Midwest it will take a very long time for a body to decompose. A better alternative is to use the Potassium Hydroxide (KOH) solution to dissolve all living cells in a very short time. The used solution is a fertilizer and harmless to the environment. This method is often called "green burial". In the Western states where vultures are common, a "sky burial" is preferable. Sky burials are common in higher elevation regions of Tibet and Nepal and are consistent with the Buddhist tradition.
4
Just for starters…Please…What about the Urban Burial Project? The other name is far too scary.
2
Manley’s Cemeteries
Carrying this discussion a little farther, I have long thought that cemeteries are essentially wasted plots of real estate that have great potential for improving our lives. Many years ago, when my sons were pre-school, they loved to romp in the local graveyard. So at Manley’s Cemeteries, instead of tombstones -- and what’s that all about? -- we will have remarkably durable playground structures made of marble, granite, steel, and plastic ... and with plaques commemorating the lives of deceased contributors prominently displayed for all to see and appreciate.
Of course, there will be swimming pools (and can’t you just envision the Frizbane Manley Memorial three-meter board), lawn bowling, ice skating rinks, skateboard parks, shuffleboard -- the possibilities are limited only by one’s imagination -- and the whole kit and caboodle will be financed by the dead. I happen to think cemeteries are close to absurd in principle, and I break out in a smile whenever I imagine graveyards all over the country being gradually transformed into playgrounds. I realize it cannot happen overnight, but just give me a decade or so ...
Carrying this discussion a little farther, I have long thought that cemeteries are essentially wasted plots of real estate that have great potential for improving our lives. Many years ago, when my sons were pre-school, they loved to romp in the local graveyard. So at Manley’s Cemeteries, instead of tombstones -- and what’s that all about? -- we will have remarkably durable playground structures made of marble, granite, steel, and plastic ... and with plaques commemorating the lives of deceased contributors prominently displayed for all to see and appreciate.
Of course, there will be swimming pools (and can’t you just envision the Frizbane Manley Memorial three-meter board), lawn bowling, ice skating rinks, skateboard parks, shuffleboard -- the possibilities are limited only by one’s imagination -- and the whole kit and caboodle will be financed by the dead. I happen to think cemeteries are close to absurd in principle, and I break out in a smile whenever I imagine graveyards all over the country being gradually transformed into playgrounds. I realize it cannot happen overnight, but just give me a decade or so ...
8
It ain't what it seems. I can only think not ..."Soylent Green". In 2015. I could be be ..... an Oak or an Evergreen. Ah, what a future, a body bound into the earth with roots of steel clinging to hopes for a cleaner unblighted future.
2
"For the environmentally conscious, cremation is a problematic option, as the process releases greenhouse gases." Composting also releases greenhouse gases.
If done well, composting releases mostly CO2, the same a cremation, but will always release some methane, which is a much worse greenhouse gas. I would like to see the analysis, but I suspect the global warming potential of composting is actually worse than cremation.
If done well, composting releases mostly CO2, the same a cremation, but will always release some methane, which is a much worse greenhouse gas. I would like to see the analysis, but I suspect the global warming potential of composting is actually worse than cremation.
2
Inspired by the notion of "whale falls", islands of life nurtured by whale corpses that have fallen into the relatively sterile ocean bottom, and by a long history of burials at sea, I want my corpse loaded into a burlap sack with a large quantity of rocks, hauled out by kayak from Moss Landing into the Monterey Canyon and dropped to become a relatively miniscule "fall." In that way, I will nurture a small, brief burst of benthic life in a way that entails a lot less expense and work than composting on land.
3
If this interests you, read "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" by Cailtin Doughty.
2
The body is absorbed back into the biosphere to become part of the circle of life with everything else that lives and dies. The elegant beauty of it becomes less attractive because it reduces bodies in the end to just so many molecules of organic material, no different than the bits of planets in which the bodies decompose. At some point it seems like the processing planet in the story Soylent Green, effective and efficient and trivializing of the special significance of the lives of people have had to other people when they lived.
Fascinating and perhaps timely? Here in Montgomery county MD we have been on board with composting our most recently deceased livestock - 2 horses and 4 sheep in the past 6 years. They simply disappear in an amazingly short time and there is something so profound and appropriate about the process - almost primal - in such a complete giving back to the earth. Several neighboring farms now employ the practice and interest is growing here.
5
Oh, the "yuck factor." Give me a break. This is a great way to return to whence we came. Talk about "yuck"; burial in an airtight coffin is straight out of Edgar Allen Poe and being rolled into a fire is a whole other nightmare. Peacefully rotting back into the ground is the one method that doesn't have a "yuck" factor, if you ask me.
6
Although I view this idea as impractical to scale, I was staying open-minded until the end. If the goal is for a planet-healthy green burial, as a former geography major who grew up in Oregon ranching country, I feel the need to point out that alfalfa requires more water than other crops. Until a drought-resistant strain can be developed, it seems that particular part of the procedure could be worse for the environment than whatever cremation greenhouse gasses are currently being released.
3
This will work. I composted a 10-pound road-kill raccoon by putting it into our simple WalMart composter (basically a 3-foot cubed, vented black vinyl box) containing yard and kitchen debris. Dog and I found the animal near our home while returning home several years ago on a late-June evening. We had been experiencing raccoon damage to our vegetable garden, so I saw great justice in putting the presumed villain into the composter. Two days later I found maggots covering the composter surface near where I had buried the animal. So, I buried the cadaver better in the composter contents and forgot about it. The following April I turned the composter contents looking for bones. No bones! Every vestige of the animal was gone. If my primitive attempt to compost an animal can work, then surely an entire human body can be composed with careful control of co-materials, moisture and temperature.
5
This looks like a variation on a theme of Soylent Green.
This is so excellent! I am completely comforted by the thought of worms, etc turning me back into soil. I have thought this all my life. After all, we are the same animals as all the others who die and decompose all over the Earth.....
2
Where can I buy a t-shirt? 'Urban Death Project' in black, of course.
5
Dead should be buried in a sheet only without a box.This way the body becomes a part of the soil as time passes.
1
While I am sure the technology will work, since 1998 we have been employing a lower tech solution that also protects and ecologically restores natural areas: conservation burial. This involves relatively shallow graves and plantings of native wildflowers, trees, grasses and ferns. The body decomposes and the nutrients help support the life over it. Conservation Burial combines conservation biology and restoration ecology to design multidimensional social and ecological spaces. The Ramsey Creek Preserve is the prototype, and many more projects are now on line or are in development. A general talk (from TEDx Greenville) on the concept is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyA0VLzOPPA .
4
The band, Poi Dog Pondering recommended this about 20 years ago:
"A lifetime of accomplishments of which the dirt knows none,
only in death can one truly return
Return the carrots, the apples and potatoes,
The chickens, the cows, the fish and tomatoes.
In one glorious swoop, let the deed be done
and bury me deep so that I can be one...
And all around my muscle and all around my bone,
don't incinerate me or seal me from
the dirt which bore me, the bed that which from
the rain falls upon and the fruit comes from
For the dirt is a blanket, no fiery tomb,
No punishment, reward, or pearly white room
And you who say that in death we will pay,
The dead they can't hear a word that you say
Your words are not kind, sober or giving,
they only put fear in the hearts of the living
So put away your tongues and roll up your sleeves,
and pick up your shovel and bury me deep."
"A lifetime of accomplishments of which the dirt knows none,
only in death can one truly return
Return the carrots, the apples and potatoes,
The chickens, the cows, the fish and tomatoes.
In one glorious swoop, let the deed be done
and bury me deep so that I can be one...
And all around my muscle and all around my bone,
don't incinerate me or seal me from
the dirt which bore me, the bed that which from
the rain falls upon and the fruit comes from
For the dirt is a blanket, no fiery tomb,
No punishment, reward, or pearly white room
And you who say that in death we will pay,
The dead they can't hear a word that you say
Your words are not kind, sober or giving,
they only put fear in the hearts of the living
So put away your tongues and roll up your sleeves,
and pick up your shovel and bury me deep."
21
The surname of the proponent here is most unfortunate. Nonetheless, the intent is noble. But, loves ones still wish to leave a monument and epitaph of some sort, even if it be only in a garden bed. Allow me to suggest some new standard ones for this new process---Good bye Mr. Chips. Cashed in his chips. Still looking chipper. Let the chips fall where they may. Compost mortem. Rest in pieces. Here lies Peat. The possibilities are endless. And the final resting places will need new names as well. I suggest Forest Lawn Care. I leave the rest to others with fertilizer imaginations.
4
Lots of people have pointed out the numerous alternatives that already exist around the world. The one thing that makes the least sense is the most common practice in the US, i.e., chemical embalming and sealing up in a hermetic container that is itself further sealed up in a concrete vault. The article did well to at least briefly note that this completely unnatural process was mostly an artifact of the Civil War, and a technological fix for a very unusual problem. There's absolutely no reason to hang onto this, as I think we now realize and move to more sensible practices. BTW, think again if you think that composting somehow avoids emission of greenhouse gases.
2
Love it. Compassionate Composting in Maine provides this service for large animal owners (horses, etc.) and it is an amazingly priceless place to visit - the quietest paddock ever. Michelle Melaragno (owner) does a super job of providing solace to the owners of these beloved animals - and returning their bodies to the earth in a green manner.
Thank you for the article - I will hope that eventually this will be an available option for the BILLIONS of us that are infesting the planet. It is the least that we can do for the inorganic cycles of the planet.
Thank you for the article - I will hope that eventually this will be an available option for the BILLIONS of us that are infesting the planet. It is the least that we can do for the inorganic cycles of the planet.
2
Why does Soylent Green come immediately to mind in this context?
Juuuust sayin' is all...
John~
American Net'Zen
Juuuust sayin' is all...
John~
American Net'Zen
Jessica Mitford's excellent book, "The American Way of Death" really exposed the funeral industry for what it is, a business that rakes in millions off the grief and bereavement of those who've lost loved ones. This composting idea makes so much sense financially and environmentally it's ridiculous. Is it really necessary to spend thousands of dollars to have all your internal organs removed, your body pumped with formaldehyde, your carcass crammed in an overpriced casket so your final resting place can be a hole in the ground? Even cremation gets pricey when you add in all the extras. Turning corpses into compost should be the norm, because the truth is, for thousands of years it actually was.
2
Soylent brown
1
religion aside, probably people have been buried for thousands of years for the smell, and for vultures and animals, who would feast on the remains of a loved one. in the northeast, for building code, one must dig 42" down for footings which must be set below the frostline. 15 years ago, while building a house, and being the low man on the jobsite, i was asked to dig a hole for the families deceased labrodor retriever. as in, "here's a shovel, have at it". my carpentry skills weren't so good at the time, so i wanted to dig an appropriately sized and deep hole for this big animal's corpse. i didn't smoke and was physically fit even almost at 40 years, so, i tore into it. i had dug many holes for pole barns, so i was used to it. the hole was giant. as i finished and inspected my work, the boyfriend of the customer came carrying the dead dog, while his fiancee beside him weeping over the animals corpse, saying, "bye my best friend". they appreciated the depth of the hole. i got paid by the dude, and then went back to my framing job up the hill. later, the exhusband of the woman came and quickly covered over the deceased beast. there was a show of repsect to an animal. only thing, looking back, i probably should've refused the $20 tip. i was being paid for building there house by the hour. but, i took the bill as they were wealthy. i stashed the bill in my shirt, as it were.
1
At age ten, reading "The Ballad of William Sycamore," I found this:
"Now I lie in the heart of the fat, black soil
Like the seed of the prayer thistle.
It has ashed my bones with honey and oil,
And picked them clean as a whistle.
And my youth returns, like the rains of Spring
And my sons, like the wild geese flying.
And I lie and hear a meadowlark sing
And have much content in dying."
Preoccupied with death and hellfire from a parochial grade-school upbringing, I thought, "Wow. That doesn't sound too bad!" No question that decomposition inside a sealed container is much more "Ew" than in soil.
Remember, burial regulations are written by the funeral industry, with free rein because the public "doesn't want to think about it."
"Now I lie in the heart of the fat, black soil
Like the seed of the prayer thistle.
It has ashed my bones with honey and oil,
And picked them clean as a whistle.
And my youth returns, like the rains of Spring
And my sons, like the wild geese flying.
And I lie and hear a meadowlark sing
And have much content in dying."
Preoccupied with death and hellfire from a parochial grade-school upbringing, I thought, "Wow. That doesn't sound too bad!" No question that decomposition inside a sealed container is much more "Ew" than in soil.
Remember, burial regulations are written by the funeral industry, with free rein because the public "doesn't want to think about it."
3
I'm trying to imagine the opportunistic Christian politicos/FOX news opposition arguments. This should be fun!
3
This could never work on a large scale, and people would have to be tested for diseases like Creutzfeldt-Jakob before being placed in the ground. Livestock that farmers put to decompose don't have diseases that can pass to humans. Pine boxes still afford the environment a degree of safety from the body, especially if the fluids have been drained, but I have trouble imagining that the box breaks down quickly; you would still have a great deal of matter in the box. What about in the winter, when mortuaries have trouble burying their dead due to frozen ground? Can you imagine the stench from having to bury several bodies at once? In arid regions like the American SW, bodies would likely desiccate before decomposing. They couldn't be near a water supply or in an area where they are in the path of runoff. Sorry to be morbid, but this could work if the body was ground up, bones and all, before being mixed up with mulch, because the decomposition process on a large scale would have to be quick.
There is a relatively small Jewish population, doing this on a scale of NYC would be impossible .... and in the case of an epidemic, bodies would have to be burned.
There is a relatively small Jewish population, doing this on a scale of NYC would be impossible .... and in the case of an epidemic, bodies would have to be burned.
3
Wow..... next step, Soylent Green.
What an amazing idea, Bravo Ms. Spade! This is an example of the way humans can live on this planet harmoniously, as a healthy participant in the natural world we live in.
1
It ain't what it seems. I can only think..."Soylent Green". In 2015. I want to be ..... an Oak
1
'When it's my time, lay me out on the old compost heap in the backyard' is what we say of our deaths, jokingly. But we're not really joking. We have no emotional attachment to rituals, or even to what our survivors think they need. As avid composters and conservers, that is what we would like most. It's great to hear someone is working on this. I hope one will come to a town near us soon...what would it be called? Our Loam in Heaven? Greenlawn? Earth Rites?
There is no issue with composting meats in the pile, as long as it is covered and the greens and browns are balanced. Squirrels and woodchucks have gone into mine and are now pushing up the daisies.
I'd like to donate my organs to the soil microbes. They've taken a big hit from the Anthropocene.
There is no issue with composting meats in the pile, as long as it is covered and the greens and browns are balanced. Squirrels and woodchucks have gone into mine and are now pushing up the daisies.
I'd like to donate my organs to the soil microbes. They've taken a big hit from the Anthropocene.
1
I would like to be put in a wooden box and buried up on my hillside, where we once had a garden.... perhaps plant an oak tree over my remains. Very effective recycling (and it won't cost $2,500.... a figure I find a bit ridiculous!)
3
Certainly the modern funeral industry is appalling (pun intended). Simple direct burial seems much more humane. When I buried my cat myself, it eased my heart. But it's obvious there are technical issues. However, the waste and toxicity in modern burial are excessive. In weighting the small and the big, the rough and the smooth, it seems a reasonable idea.
But I agree that it is not a likely solution to climate change, though any form of waste and extravagance reduction are helpful.
But I agree that it is not a likely solution to climate change, though any form of waste and extravagance reduction are helpful.
1
My mom, who passed in December, would have loved this. She was an avid gardener and composter AND she liked to push the envelope by showing how little she cared for convention. One problem that occurs to me is that by the time that she died she was full of pharmaceuticals—steroids, antibiotics, heart, seizure, and pulmonary meds. We try to control the dispersal of these chemicals into the environment.
27
I want my body pumped full of chemicals and preserved forever in a "Rock of Ages" tomb. Only that method truly preserves my cultural heritage and wards off fears of past cultural and historical horrors.
Perhaps in a few thousand years archaeologists will examine my intact corpse and then fully understand what I, and my culture, really stood for.
And, of course, at the Last Judgment, I can be restored to my body as it really was in life.
Perhaps in a few thousand years archaeologists will examine my intact corpse and then fully understand what I, and my culture, really stood for.
And, of course, at the Last Judgment, I can be restored to my body as it really was in life.
1
This is a great idea, even though not a new idea. Cremating bodies and immersing ashes in "sacred" rivers of India or burying bodies without casket and embalming, as it is done in "third-world countries", achieve the same goal of composting human bodies. But, Ms. Spade's method is better for the environment.
1
What a peculiarliy repellant article, so reminiscent of what the Nazis did to their innumerable death camp victims, and almost echoing their rationale for killing so many "enemies of the Reich": at least by making them useful as compost after death. I suspect most readers will have a similar reaction to this piece, so typical of political correctness in its mealy-mouthed pretension that it serves a higher purpose other than to reinforce someone's misguided self-righteousness.
3
Long before I am again intersellar dust, I can be compost for a dogwood. Excellent! Bits of myself will be taken up from the soil to grow into winter buds that will become flowers in the spring. In the dirt below, I will feed numerous life forms and be excreted back into the soil. I will always be recycling and my passing and living with be "green."
10
I'm in. Seems perfect. Hope it's available in my state soon.
6
The Parsis of India dispose of the dead in an most environmentally sound method,they place the dead on top of an Tower of Silence also known as Dakhma for birds of prey like Vultures to eat the body,which is done within a few minutes.
The bones that remain gets bleached by sun & fall into Ossuary pit where it disintegrate by the action of Lime.
The remaining material gets run off during rains through a multiple layers of Coal & Sand Filters into the ocean.
This type of disposal of dead is beneficial for birds of prey & is in the highest principle of going back to nature seamlessly.
The concept of creating organic Compost from the dead is an innovative method that needs to be encouraged.
Katrina Spade needs to given an Nobel Prize for alternative thinking.
Thank you NYT for posting her story
The bones that remain gets bleached by sun & fall into Ossuary pit where it disintegrate by the action of Lime.
The remaining material gets run off during rains through a multiple layers of Coal & Sand Filters into the ocean.
This type of disposal of dead is beneficial for birds of prey & is in the highest principle of going back to nature seamlessly.
The concept of creating organic Compost from the dead is an innovative method that needs to be encouraged.
Katrina Spade needs to given an Nobel Prize for alternative thinking.
Thank you NYT for posting her story
4
"I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged.
Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you."
from Walt Whitman, "Song of Myself"
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged.
Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you."
from Walt Whitman, "Song of Myself"
9
Thank you for this reminder. "Song of myself" is what we all do, certainly, as all these comments attest. And we don't want to be 'wasteful,' but at the same time permit some room for ritual, family grief. I still put pots of bulbs on my parents' tombstone periodically throughout the year. "Donating one's body to science" is often noted as an option, but never explained - the first step is to contact your state Health Department to inquire about the Humanity Gifts Registry.
1
I'm skeptical in terms of composting human remains which could eventually end up being placed in plastic bags, shipped to anywhere and sold in the local lawn and garden store, like so much manure. I've heard of "green burials", but think this method of composting remains is a bit bizarre. The living needs the cemetery and the tombstone as a material thing they can see and touch and pay homage to, and the names engraved on granite stone gives testament to the fact their loved ones ever existed. Not to mention, future generations will have nothing by which to trace their heritage.
3
I released my grandmother's ashes, last month, in a biodegradable urn to the waters of a local beach she always loved. There's no stone, just the fact that she is there and will be forever. No need for a mute stone to pay tribute to a calcified tradition.
I am shamed by the recyclist environmentalists to recycle, not use weed killing insecticides, to buy expensive bulbs that don't use as much electricity and are environmentally better. I am cajoled into preserving water and fuel and to eat foods grown without pesticides and natural fertilizer.
Now I'm told at the near end of my life that my plans for cremation of my body is adding to the destructive gases in the atmosphere.
Enough already.
Now I'm told at the near end of my life that my plans for cremation of my body is adding to the destructive gases in the atmosphere.
Enough already.
3
Have you ever considered why you're being asked to do these things?
Insecticides pollute waterways we drink out of, for example. Or they kill pollinators that we rely on to grow food.
All of these ideas environmentalists are suggestings are to help you and your family enjoy life for many generations to come.
Billions upon billions of people will be dying over the coming decades, so this is a very important topic.
Insecticides pollute waterways we drink out of, for example. Or they kill pollinators that we rely on to grow food.
All of these ideas environmentalists are suggestings are to help you and your family enjoy life for many generations to come.
Billions upon billions of people will be dying over the coming decades, so this is a very important topic.
I have been telling my family for years that what I would want is to be shredded and sprinkled onto the compost pile in the backyard. To lie dying and know that my bits and pieces would soon be feeding the life in my own backyard would be a comfort I'd greatly appreciate. But no, even here in Germany, my body has to go in a hole in the ground or as ashes into a jar in a wall somewhere. (I could get my ashes into a small box beneath a tree in a "cemetery forest") I would just so much rather go unburned, undried, unpoisoned, whole back to nature, to feed the life that fed me during my fleeting moment of organized structure. Sigh.
8
Organic burial and decomposition celebrate the circle of life and offer humans the opportunity to return to our truest home: Earth. I cannot think of a more spiritually complete journey than for my body to support life after death.
The embalming process and burning in a 2000-degree oven are rather violent exits, if you ask me. Being locked in a wooden box within a metal vault underground sounds awfully claustrophobic. No?
The law should allow for all of us to become one with Mother Nature again.
The embalming process and burning in a 2000-degree oven are rather violent exits, if you ask me. Being locked in a wooden box within a metal vault underground sounds awfully claustrophobic. No?
The law should allow for all of us to become one with Mother Nature again.
6
Whoever made the sangiovese comment is genius. You'd be able to say "kids, let's crack open a bottle of grandma for Christmas." I was thinking a fruit tree, but no, I'm gonna be Zinfandel.
3
This is a terrific idea. I had thought of being eaten by dermestid beetles like they use in museums, or perhaps having my body exposed to be eaten by birds, as the Zoroastrians did for centuries, but this is even better. I hope to live long enough to go out this way. Pretty soon we will be allowed to decide the where, when and how of our deaths and this will lend a helpful finality to it all.
4
Sounds good to me. All though personally I'd prefer to be cremated. But if my remains could be converted into something "useful", then all the better.
4
My parents were very clear in their belief that their bodies were not the part of them that they wanted honored in death. Their solution was donating their corpses to the local medical school. We had big memorial services (no body present) for each of them. The medical school made serious efforts to let us know that they were treating the donated corpses respectfully, including inviting us to a ceremony when they were finally buried. Or I assume that was true for my father; mother died eleven years after him and she didn't mention any such communication about his body. I got the mailings about her. My brother and I got a chuckle out of that being more ceremony than she would have condoned. [She always said that their solution only worked if the whole family was happy with it. But I'm pretty sure she also thought that everyone should be happy with it.]
5
Tibetan Buddhists and Zoroastrians traditionally practiced sky burials where the bodies of the dead were exposed to be eaten by birds of prey.
Mourning and remembrance and respect are in the heart, not in a bottle of embalming fluid.
I would like the idea that a tree will grow from me after I am gone - to become part of an everlasting renewal.
Mourning and remembrance and respect are in the heart, not in a bottle of embalming fluid.
I would like the idea that a tree will grow from me after I am gone - to become part of an everlasting renewal.
19
I am a Buddhist and while I know I'd never get one, a sky burial was always my first choice.
The idea of compost is very, very appealing.
The idea of compost is very, very appealing.
3
Sign me up. The thought of my remains nurturing a valley oak here in Sacramento has great appeal. And it is far more drought aware than being buried under a patch of lawn.
9
Oh, yes! Is there a list? A sign-up sheet somewhere? Brilliant! Just brilliant! (And long overdue.)
9
I live in Japan. No space. So after cremation, ashes are brought to the cemetery where a small rock behind the gravestone is removed, and ashes are poured into a hole. The tombstone marks the family plot. Your last remains are left there and time moves on. It's elegant, efficient, and an economical solution for those who don't feel like being left as mulch. Besides, you'll have a place for the living to visit you. I hope it catches on in the USA.
5
I find this beautiful, elegant and gracious! I hope it catches everywhere.
3
Lee Hays (Weavers) wanted to be cremated so his ashes could be added to his compost heap and he could come back as next year's tomatoes. This approach would streamline the process by eliminating the need for cremation. I like this approach a lot. Need to save this article so I have it for future reference.
7
My wishes for when I die - do whatever is easier for the surviving family. If I'm on a boat when I die, throw me overboard. If I'm hiking in the woods, leave me there.
9
As for me, I'd rather leave a bit of green space for my great-great grandchildren to play soccer. We humans do not have the most symbiotic relationship with Mother Nature - it would nice to be laid to rest as her equal.
For the skeptics - what do you think happens when they lower the box into the ground?
For the skeptics - what do you think happens when they lower the box into the ground?
13
I've always liked the idea that the Swedish have of "freeze-drying", since I really hate the heat. But the idea of the freeze-dried or cremation remains being pressurized over months and be turned into a diamond has its appeal. Having my ashes or whatever mixed with those of my former cats and dogs, (which I've kept), and turned into a diamond, so we sparkle along together forever, is my favorite. At that point, I don't care who wears it...
4
jeez. with all that hullabalue, donation to science is, sadly, looking like a less fretful prospect.
man: do you do "composting"? if you do, then you'll balk at the legalisms, and idiotic recidivist ritualisms being addressed here.
man: sneak the body in to a compost that's meant for the "decomposition' of Meat. and DEAL with it.
stop carrying the lugubrious notions of hearses, and rehearsals, into what should be a very conscientious and enlightened life behavior.
can't believe all the baggage this reportage had to bring with it.
oh well, just sayin' . . .
nb: it is essential that the practitioners really know what composting is, and more or less how to do it.
after all, everything is a learning experience, no?
man: do you do "composting"? if you do, then you'll balk at the legalisms, and idiotic recidivist ritualisms being addressed here.
man: sneak the body in to a compost that's meant for the "decomposition' of Meat. and DEAL with it.
stop carrying the lugubrious notions of hearses, and rehearsals, into what should be a very conscientious and enlightened life behavior.
can't believe all the baggage this reportage had to bring with it.
oh well, just sayin' . . .
nb: it is essential that the practitioners really know what composting is, and more or less how to do it.
after all, everything is a learning experience, no?
1
Read how the Tibetans do it... with vultures!
4
A Sky Burial is very appealing indeed!
The traditional method of interment, however fancy, eventually results in the body decaying. It is purely a matter of constructed taste as to whether this should happen below or above ground. If the body becomes of use to the community, and reduces emissions, then a new tradition could certainly be constructed around it. I am an avid composter and although my Portland Metro compost box is efficient I am hoping my family will seek professional help when they seek to compost me rather than stuffing me in with the coffee grounds, banana skins and egg shells.
8
OK, so who else other than yours truly began to sing "Homegrown Tomatoes" by the great Guy Clark while reading this article?
When I die don't bury me
In a box in a cemetery
Out in the garden'd be much better
Where I could be pushing' up homegrown tomatoes.
- G Clark
When I die don't bury me
In a box in a cemetery
Out in the garden'd be much better
Where I could be pushing' up homegrown tomatoes.
- G Clark
3
Or the great John Prine song of the same ilk...
Please don't bury me
Down in that cold cold ground
No, I'd druther have "em" cut me up
And pass me all around
Throw my brain in a hurricane
And the blind can have my eyes
And the deaf can take both of my ears
If they don't mind the size
Give my stomach to Milwaukee
If they run out of beer
Put my socks in a cedar box
Just get "em" out of here
Venus de Milo can have my arms
Look out! I've got your nose
Sell my heart to the junkman
And give my love to Rose
Please don't bury me
Down in that cold cold ground
No, I'd druther have "em" cut me up
And pass me all around
Throw my brain in a hurricane
And the blind can have my eyes
And the deaf can take both of my ears
If they don't mind the size
Give my stomach to Milwaukee
If they run out of beer
Put my socks in a cedar box
Just get "em" out of here
Venus de Milo can have my arms
Look out! I've got your nose
Sell my heart to the junkman
And give my love to Rose
1
I like Willie Nelson's version myself.
Previously I've said that I would be happy to be canned as dog food after I die. Composting is also fine with me. I don't place any spiritual or other such value on my remains - all that I hope for are good memories shared by those still alive. And when they die, and those who know them die, the memories will vanish, just as I did. It's the natural pattern of life. Maybe the dog will remember a particularly nice meal for a few hours.
8
My remains should be handled in any way that will comfort my son. I hope he'll be sensible and will not spend money he does not have. What ever happens will in no way matter to me because I will be dead.
The reason we have burials is to comfort those we leave. And if we leave no one then the community needs to do what will reflect it's values.
The reason we have burials is to comfort those we leave. And if we leave no one then the community needs to do what will reflect it's values.
3
Ms. Spade is on to something deep, but then she has an aptonymical advantage! Great project and an excellent piece. Thank you.
6
There may be more drawbacks than benefits to composting - one giant one is climate change. If millions of human bodies are composted continually, just think of the heat and the odor generated. How does one check on the status of the decay? Then the next question: what is to be done with the compost when the process is complete.? Would you want it on YOUR garden? If not, on whose? I believe many people would begin repeating that old mantra: NOT IN MY BACK YARD (NIMBY). I believe I have just made a new decision to NOT become a vegetarian........
3
Soylent Green Redux!
1
I've always wanted to be buried next to a grand old tree. Let the tree draw a few nutrients from my departed shell and release a few molecules into the wind. If trees could get high?
Believe the mafia have been utilizing these techniques for years.
6
That is about 3 times what a basic cremation costs in San Francisco.
1
Where do I sign up? Once they take my organs if they can this sounds like a great idea.
4
This is how 1500 lb horses and cattle are disposed of in places that allow wood-chip composting of livestock carcasses. If you can compost such a large animal - why not a 150- 200 lb human???
5
I'm an avid composter, but only vegetable based waste. One problem I see with this plan is that the wildlife in my area (including vermin) like to rummage through my compost pile for food. I just wonder how shocking it will be to see a coyote trotting around with granny's leg?
3
The composting thing kind of grosses me out, but the idea of a green burial is appealing. Foxfield Preserve in Ohio has my attention. That, or cremation-to-fireworks, although admittedly the latter isn't quite as energy- or emissions-minded.
1
Seems a little "Soylent Green/Matrix" to me
Soylent green is people!
Commenters opposed to this idea seem to think it is "undignified" or doesn't treat the human body "with respect." Like injecting the body with toxic chemicals and then sealing it inside a metal box placed inside a concrete vault (so that the same disintegration can still occur except not so quickly) is something particularly dignified or respectful. The real respect that's paid the dead comes not from the grotesque farce that is our contemporary "processing" of their bodies, but from our visiting the places where the dead are interred and from how we go about remembering them in life. And in my cemetery experiences over the years, let's just say I've never been overwhelmed by the crowds.
I think this is a magnificent testimonial to the connection between all living things. I'm a gardener, and I deeply respect the enormous good that worms and microbes do to sustain life on this planet. And if I were ultimately to get composted and spread around the lilacs in the yard, that would suit me just fine.
I think this is a magnificent testimonial to the connection between all living things. I'm a gardener, and I deeply respect the enormous good that worms and microbes do to sustain life on this planet. And if I were ultimately to get composted and spread around the lilacs in the yard, that would suit me just fine.
14
It's amusing to me how much of an outcry there is against this idea; not the majority but a vocal and emotional minority. This despite the fact that once we die, we have absolutely no use for or connection to our body, and it can't possibly last intact without considerable technological investment (eg: keeping it frozen).
So allow me to put this mild idea in perspective a bit. This is not the most efficient way to recycle humans. Meat is not good compost, we don't have that many minerals that plants really need, even though battlefields do make for good agricultural land, that's mostly because of the vast number of humans in them.
The best way to use human bodies, brace yourselves, is feeding them to pigs. We eat an awful lot of pork products, and pigs use a heck of a lot of our agricultural output and water supplies. Pigs will eat most organic things, and don't mind eating humans in the slightest. Rather than using our limited fresh water to grow plant food for pigs, we could provide them with bodies on a pretty constant basis, as three Americans die every minute.
Now I'm not actually in favor of this idea, but it's a far better use of the resource of ex-humans, and maybe it'll make composting folks not seem so bad, comparatively. And the day may well come when our love of bacon drives us to this measure.
So allow me to put this mild idea in perspective a bit. This is not the most efficient way to recycle humans. Meat is not good compost, we don't have that many minerals that plants really need, even though battlefields do make for good agricultural land, that's mostly because of the vast number of humans in them.
The best way to use human bodies, brace yourselves, is feeding them to pigs. We eat an awful lot of pork products, and pigs use a heck of a lot of our agricultural output and water supplies. Pigs will eat most organic things, and don't mind eating humans in the slightest. Rather than using our limited fresh water to grow plant food for pigs, we could provide them with bodies on a pretty constant basis, as three Americans die every minute.
Now I'm not actually in favor of this idea, but it's a far better use of the resource of ex-humans, and maybe it'll make composting folks not seem so bad, comparatively. And the day may well come when our love of bacon drives us to this measure.
4
Composting is tricky and it seems been able to get up to 140 degrees yet. I would also worry about all the chemicals and medicines we take getting into the environment.
Soylent Green! Big Brother! Minority Report! What is that saying about life imitating art or art imitating life? I hope I'm around to see Blade Runner come to life ( the good parts ) and as far as composting goes, it's a good idea. Actually, it's not even an idea it's just natural.
1
I'll take a sweet little Vermont cemetery on a gentle hill, thanks. Fairly similar if in simple wood box and without chemicals. Just a bit more ritual and easier for others to visit, should they want to. When I told an 85 year old woman in town - as she was delivering my mail -that I saw her gravestone (which she had already placed, being Yankee through and through and wanting things in order), that I bought a plot there, she laughed and said, Good! Plenty of time to talk then!
It's one of the most beautiful spots in the world. The plots cost $25 each for those who live here. It's tiny but many gravestones go back hundreds of years. History, respect, ritual, kindness, beauty, balance. Ah, Vermont.
It's one of the most beautiful spots in the world. The plots cost $25 each for those who live here. It's tiny but many gravestones go back hundreds of years. History, respect, ritual, kindness, beauty, balance. Ah, Vermont.
8
I remember an old saying (or song?) that went, "wrap me in a blanket and toss me over the cemetery wall." That's always appealed to me, but composting sounds even better. Anything other than embalming me in formaldehyde. Ugh!
3
$2500? Cremation of my husband's body cost a mere $700 five years ago. I received the cremains to do as I (and he) wished. Not that it is legal to place human (sterile) cremains most places, but there are ways. This death business i a profitable one.
It may not be too long until Soylent Green.
Tie my body to some rocks and toss me in the deep blue sea. Let the fishes do the rest.
Sounds like a great idea, I'm all for it. On a practical level my first thought was that measures need to be taken to keep scavenging carnivores away. Not that I would mind my remains being excavated by the local coyotes or the neighbour's dog, but passersby might find it unaesthetic...
I have always dreamt of returning as a cucumber.
1
Sounds like a most excellent way to spread human parasites and diseases from even more places than they already are. There's a reason in the U.S. why mortuaries, crematoriums, undertakers, health workers, etc. are licensed/certificated. You need to know what you're doing to avoid doing more harm than good.
1
I'm almost 62 and heading for the last roundup, so this is intriguing. I wouldn't want to be added to the compost pile in some facility. But I think it would be great if there was a home body-composting kit, wood chips, etc, that my family could do in our backyard, in a inconspicuous area. I wouldn't even mind being put up off the ground, exposed to the elements, how some Native American tribes handled their dead. The traditional way, with calling hours, embalming, and caskets is just plain stupid. Cremation is a poor second choice. Composting seems like a great idea. Probably the Evangelicals in Indiana or Arkansas will outlaw it.
2
As a Jew, I tell folks that my last job will be a worm and maggot farm. We do not preserve our dead and I will be buried unadorned in a plain pine coffin, dressed in a simple cotton shroud and wrapped in my natural-fiber tallit with the fringes cut off.
I should be at my last job not too longer after the burial.
I should be at my last job not too longer after the burial.
5
Every time I look in the mirror and see all those wrinkles, I realize that I already AM rapidly composting. I used to think that cremation would be environmentally responsible, but then I bought a grave sight as I observed that graveyards will never be uprooted and turned into mini mauls or some other awful development. Now that composting idea sounds pretty good to me.
I think they got the quote marks wrong describing the process. Shouldn't it read laying in "ceremony"? I can't get the picture out of my mind of a ramp to a giant fast food waste bin with a large circular hole to deposit the beloved. I'm sure this is very cost effective and profitable for a funeral home, but I can't imagine how this serves as a dignified ceremony for the departed and their love ones.
2
I love this idea. It never occurred to me that cremation contributed to greenhouse gases. I love this idea. Personally, I would prefer to be buried at sea. To "swim with the fishes" as the saying goes.
This may be grotesque to some, but beautiful none the less.
https://youtu.be/b6hSK8CluxQ
This may be grotesque to some, but beautiful none the less.
https://youtu.be/b6hSK8CluxQ
1
Just when I think I have seen just about everything in the NYTimes - everything that goes against just about all in which I believe - you always come up with a new one.
Yes, there is a distinct "yuck" factor here. I believe in cremation, and my ashes being spread at sea or directly into the ground in a cardboard box - "dust though art to dust returneth". But compost? Yes, yuck, indeed!
As for her "laying in" ceremony, well, I'm speechless...
Yes, there is a distinct "yuck" factor here. I believe in cremation, and my ashes being spread at sea or directly into the ground in a cardboard box - "dust though art to dust returneth". But compost? Yes, yuck, indeed!
As for her "laying in" ceremony, well, I'm speechless...
That's it. No death for me, folks.
4
This is what I want for my remains; not sure my family will carry out my wishes. To the person who said bones don't rot: well, they do, it just takes longer. The whole process would go a lot faster if you put the body through a wood chipper first before mixing with the carbonaceous matter. I'm very sure my family won't go for that. ;^)
3
No surprise, the commenters who object to this idea are the ones who also bring religion into the discussion, as though we humans are somehow separate from the other animals. Delusional about being able to preserve the body after death (embalming and airtight coffins), just as they are delusional about--well, you get the idea.
9
As my time draws nearer, I know I would like my remains buried in a simple, but colorful shroud, and placed deeply, like twelve or fifteen feet underground. A couple of flowering trees planted there would be nice.
9
Sorry Mike but 12 feet down in Portland you'll be underwater, too tricky to dig that deep there I think.
1
Sign me up! It sounds like the best solution there is.
12
it's as close to burial in Israel as you can get. a simple shroud, no coffin, deep hole.
11
Both my parents were cremated, along with their dogs, at their respective time of passing.. We were to spread their ashes together. My dad passed last. The funeral manager, when handing me my dad's ashes, said many people put them on their plants. I was actually horrified, but eventually we put all the ashes around a coastal redwood that was on our property and next to the house my parents had lived in for the last years of their lives while we took care of them. We use to always put Christmas lights on that tree, which my mom loved. So there was some sentimental attachment. Anyway, that tree went ballistic. It has grown like nothing I have ever witnessed and every Christmas it is lit up for all to see and enjoy. The day will come when we no longer own this country property and we may downsize before our ashes are every collected. So the tree will not be ours to visit or decorate.
My 93 year old aunt receives great comfort from going to the cemetery and visiting her parents, husband and eventually an adult child. Some may miss that ritual, but how many of us stay in the same place where are family is buried? Much fewer now than 50 years ago. And eventually there will be no one to visit.
Composting dead bodies takes the discussion to a new level. I'm not against it if it can be done without contamination issues. For now, I've got the ashes of two two dogs on our front room shelf, with two more to go. Our plan is to be together. Location not yet determined.
My 93 year old aunt receives great comfort from going to the cemetery and visiting her parents, husband and eventually an adult child. Some may miss that ritual, but how many of us stay in the same place where are family is buried? Much fewer now than 50 years ago. And eventually there will be no one to visit.
Composting dead bodies takes the discussion to a new level. I'm not against it if it can be done without contamination issues. For now, I've got the ashes of two two dogs on our front room shelf, with two more to go. Our plan is to be together. Location not yet determined.
8
That's a beautiful story. I've always said that when I die I want a couple white birch planted and to have my ashes scattered amongst them. Thank you for sharing what you did. Truly lovely.
You have my name (above). Sign me up! But....first....tell me what it's going to cost. If it's more than a couple of hundred dollars, I'll have my kids bury me in the Adirondack Mountains just before the snow flies. I'll have a burial site and a decomposition area of my very own.
Otherwise, I'll be available (I hope) in about 20 years. Can you also put in my Chinese books, my tennis racket along with a few tennis balls, and pictures of my wife, two daughters, mother and dad, my dog, Jerry, AND a large bottle of Baltica (Russian) beer.
Otherwise, I'll be available (I hope) in about 20 years. Can you also put in my Chinese books, my tennis racket along with a few tennis balls, and pictures of my wife, two daughters, mother and dad, my dog, Jerry, AND a large bottle of Baltica (Russian) beer.
3
Or, for about $2,000 you can have a "green" burial: http://naturalburial.org/
1
I don't mind being buried in a group, so long as the group knows that they will be resurrected as part of my personal army during the coming rectification of the third reconciliation of the last of the McKetrick supplicants. Many Shuvs, Zuuls, and climate change deniers will know what it is to be roasted in the depths of a Slor that day, I can tell you!
8
I also have long been repulsed by the idea of embalming and caskets, and most in my family back two generations have been cremated. My brother passed on two months ago and donated his remains to UCSD Medical School. The idea of stardust to earth-dust and becoming a part of the great ongoing cycle of elements recycling is definitely appealing.
Or, as JW mentioned, to be deep-sixed and part of the ocean.
We can pay tribute, say goodbye, and honor memory without needing a tomb or gravesite. We are, after all, more the aggregate of our lives and love, not our bodies.
Or, as JW mentioned, to be deep-sixed and part of the ocean.
We can pay tribute, say goodbye, and honor memory without needing a tomb or gravesite. We are, after all, more the aggregate of our lives and love, not our bodies.
7
Dairy farmer here. We compost all of our livestock mortalities. With cows at least, it is necessary to cut open the rumen for a speedy decomposition. In warmer weather a 1200 pound animal will break down to clean bones within two months. Various scavengers will dig into the pile if you don't add a thick enough top layer. I've joked for years that's the way I wanted to be taken care of.
19
Composting humans sounds like a reasonable idea! However if ancient people composted their dead we would I have literally been enable to trace our ancestry or the origin of humans as we have done through anthropology. For the price of $2500 per person, it amounts to double the cost of cremation. They are no economic benefits to it. We couldn't go visited the remains of our loved ones, continuum will stop and information of our DNA will be destroyed. Something that may be important in the distant future, just as DNA helped us figure out our past. I believe this is a business scam to make someone rich. I find it cold and calculated. In Thailand they put the corpses on a huge mound and let vultures and other scavengers feed on them. It seems to be a better alternative to composting because it feeds real live animals who's food supply we are destroying. It is also free of any charge.
1
The scavenger idea makes sense. Disgusting, but more "green" than composting. First, cremation does generate heat and greenhouse gasses (gg), but so does composting. Take a rotting log in the forest, for instance. No heat is added, but it will generate some heat, as well as Carbon dioxide, a gg, and small amount of methane, a major gg. A corpse that has not been macerated or chopped up, will anaerobically break down and produce much more methane, which is way worse than the CO2 (Carbon dioxide). Cremation creates zero methane. I promise I am not a funeral home troll. The other decent "Green" idea, in terms of gg, is the alkaline bath. But then, where do you dispose of the broth? Summation: Composting is a step away from the wrong direction, but if you truly are trying to eliminate gg, you must do some really horrible things (chop up the corpse), and add air via fans, etc to prevent methane production.
We can bury our heads in the sand (no pun intended; okay, maybe some) or not, but the time will come when there is no longer room for cemeteries. Perhaps millennia from now, but it WILL happen.
Let's begin the process of thoughtful consideration of viable alternatives. My current decision had been cremation, but upon reading of this possible alternative, I would much rather have my body contribute to the circle of life, than become worthless dust, with the effects of the burning process contributing to the death of our planet.
Let's begin the process of thoughtful consideration of viable alternatives. My current decision had been cremation, but upon reading of this possible alternative, I would much rather have my body contribute to the circle of life, than become worthless dust, with the effects of the burning process contributing to the death of our planet.
5
Feed the vultures and the decomposers! But how do you prevent critters from digging up the corpses?
1
I have joked with my husband for years that when I finally drop in the garden (trowel in hand), I want to be stuffed in our compost box.
4
I so wish that it was legal to compost the bodies of ones loved ones in Massachusetts. I see no lack of decorum in such a burial, but rather a wonderful affirmation of our place in the environment. My late mother would have loved the idea of being composed. She was an avid gardener.
She chose cremation and internment of her ashes in her favorite iris bed in the back yard of the family homestead because that was all we could manage legally in this state. What she really wanted was to be put on a pallet above the ground in the manner of certain native American practices, though I think she would have loved the idea of composting.
This idea might upset some folks but it strikes me as exactly the right solution.
I would just like to have it performed on family property and not at a facility. That would not work from city folks but would work nicely for rural folk.
She chose cremation and internment of her ashes in her favorite iris bed in the back yard of the family homestead because that was all we could manage legally in this state. What she really wanted was to be put on a pallet above the ground in the manner of certain native American practices, though I think she would have loved the idea of composting.
This idea might upset some folks but it strikes me as exactly the right solution.
I would just like to have it performed on family property and not at a facility. That would not work from city folks but would work nicely for rural folk.
8
A simple pine coffin in a cemetery strikes me as a better idea for a few reasons:
1) cemeteries are sacred land, preventing development.
2) lower impact, environmentally (e.g. no building required).
3) maintains continuity with tradition.
4) avoids utilitarian overtones (the body isn't just useful, it has a use), which really are extremely "yucky" in such a context.
5) The proposed building sounds to me like a factory masquerading as a temple.
1) cemeteries are sacred land, preventing development.
2) lower impact, environmentally (e.g. no building required).
3) maintains continuity with tradition.
4) avoids utilitarian overtones (the body isn't just useful, it has a use), which really are extremely "yucky" in such a context.
5) The proposed building sounds to me like a factory masquerading as a temple.
6
Sounds like "Soylent Green" is becoming reality. From an environmental standpoint, it sounds quite reasonable. So far,my wife and I opted for cremation. She requested that her ashes be spread in a place she really liked in the Sierra.
And so we fulfilled her request, spreading her ashes in the wild.
All those minerals will do the environment some good too. No occupying space in this world in a crowded cemetary.
And so we fulfilled her request, spreading her ashes in the wild.
All those minerals will do the environment some good too. No occupying space in this world in a crowded cemetary.
I know I don't want to be "preserved" or put in a casket (talk about gross!), and I definitely prefer the thought of returning to the earth as nitrogen-rich soil from which things would grow rather than a pile of ashes. Much more natural that the current choices. I hope this spreads!
7
I want a green burial but can't afford a plot to be buried in so this composting idea is great. I just hope the idea catches on and there are human composting facilities here in the NYC metro area before I go to the great beyond.
9
By this point burial should be illegal as a moronic waste of space. Create giant parks with a remembrance area, and cremate/compost everyone.
9
Cemeteries are a waste of space? What an astonishing claim. I'd rather abolish malls.
5
Sure, but don't bill it as natural. If you've got to add nitrogen and remove dental fillings, line up 30 corpses at at time, have a ritual, etc., you are merely doing what humans do: free enterprise. If you want to feed the planet, be the animal you/humans are and simply let the other animals eat you. No room in the jungle? Do it at sea.
4
Way to go! As Epicuris said, " ...from dust to dust..."
3
Is there any chance this could be made highly affordable? An alternative to high burial costs`encountered via the funeral industry? The Affordable Burial Act?
9
It isn't whether the composting process will work, or not. Why wouldn't it work? It's not like the human body is made out of heat-resistant synthetic materials. Well, maybe some of our artificial joints and metal fillings will be a problem, but most it is regular organic material.
The question is how many people are going to want their family members, lovers, or kin to be composted? I'm guessing it will be slow to catch on until some well-known, popular people decide they are going to have their bodies composted at death. George Clooney and his new wife, for example. Come on, George, Cast your wood chips into the pile. ;-}
5
The comments illustrate a wide range of cultural reactions and preferences. But, as you point out, having a few celebrities choose composting will help--maybe even start a fad.
I buried my wonderful kitty-kat of 14 years in my backyard, wrapping her in a towel and placing flowers beneath and shove her. The next two years, the nearby vibrant lilies grew to new heights and flowered profusely. It made me happy every time I looked at it. Because I'm a gardner myself, it would make me happy thinking that once I no longer have use for it, my composted body would help bring a huge patch of black-and-blue salvia to blossom, drawing bees and hummingbirds all summer long.
15
I can no longer count how many beloved pets are buried in my backyard, exactly as you describe. However, nothing have ever planted over their graves ever grew at all. I now have them cremated and bury their ashes instead.
I have resigned myself to cremation and my ashes being used to grow a tree, but composting sounds even better.
Although, truth be told, my first choice is to have my remains sent into outer space. After all, my body will only be an empty shell, but my atoms are starstuff.
Although, truth be told, my first choice is to have my remains sent into outer space. After all, my body will only be an empty shell, but my atoms are starstuff.
4
How much greenhouse gases does cremation release into the atmosphere? Is it that big of a problem? Just curious.
1
There is a reason that every culture that has survived has burned or buried their dead far, far from fertile fields. Disease vectors should not be deliberately introduced to places people live or farm.
10
"every culture that has survived..."
Google "sky burial."
Google "sky burial."
1
I want to end up as fertilizer in a vineyard of sangiovese.
5
Great idea. I totally support this option.
4
At the least, this opens two topics which badly need addressing in our society: (1) Death is a part of life; (2) Our environmental impact is a cradle-to-grave process. Whether natural burials catch on, we will be better for the conversations opened.
11
We have put to rest a sufficient number of dogs and cats over the past 50 years without problem. For our family members, almost all have been cremated as my wife and I will be in a few years. Luckily, a small portion of me will go up in a display fireworks shell, already mostly built and sitting in my federally approved storage awaiting my demise.
3
Didn't Monty Python propose something like this? (Or was it Stephen King?)
Where does the archeology set stand? (Do they dig it?)
I thought the expression was "as old as dirt" not "the old as dirt".
Answer to Hoffa disappearance?
Has anyone thought about environmental impact of increased demand for wood chips?
Where does the archeology set stand? (Do they dig it?)
I thought the expression was "as old as dirt" not "the old as dirt".
Answer to Hoffa disappearance?
Has anyone thought about environmental impact of increased demand for wood chips?
3
In the course of researching my ancestry, I found that my earliest known ancestor had been likely buried in a German Lutheran cemetery in downtown Philadelphia c. 1810. Unfortunately, urban pressures caused the grave to be moved two or even three times and is now lost. His son's grave and cemetery were moved in the 1950s so Temple University could have a parking lot. His present location outside of Philadelphia is known, but I was advised that there was not a great deal left when the transfers were made.
Cemeteries likely preserve the dead for less time than people imagine. However, they do provide green spaces, often in areas that could use them. Indeed, Washington and Madison squares were mass burial sites and cemeteries inspired our urban parks.
Cemeteries likely preserve the dead for less time than people imagine. However, they do provide green spaces, often in areas that could use them. Indeed, Washington and Madison squares were mass burial sites and cemeteries inspired our urban parks.
6
I think the writer Louise Erdrich depicted new life growing from a human deceased in a forest in her novel TRACKS.
I've told my family to find a good pig farmer in PA and arrange to have my remains thrown into his pen. I owe them (the pigs) big time for years of tasty BLT sandwiches. It's only fair.
14
I'm with you! It would do us ALL good (even my PETA friends) to analyze to whom we owe what!
I told my wife to scatter my ashes over the park projects I've managed. Discreetly, of course!
4
Lovely! Particularly with the Ebola and all. Back to nature, back to the caves.
1
Even Omar Khayyam dreamed of being buried with flowers planted over him. When it is my time I should wish for the same. To go back to the earth from which we came -- unpickled, unburnt. Like our little friends past, buried in our pet cemetery and pushing up the lilacs. A constructive end to a hopefully constructive life. Could I ask for more?
1
The great English author Robert Graves wrote a very funny story, "Earth to Earth," about an eccentric couple who use the huge, super-hot compost pile on their WW2-era farm to eliminate unwanted corpses.
8
You can't put meat in a compost heap! What would James Crockett say?
1
Can a DNA sample be preserved before the destruction of the body? It can tell many stories, that otherwise will vanish forever.
4
Dear RedPill,
DNA can't tell all that much, since everyone's is 99% the same, but slightly different, and thus unique from everyone else's. However, as long as bones remained, thousands of years from now, DNA could easily be gotten from them.
DNA can't tell all that much, since everyone's is 99% the same, but slightly different, and thus unique from everyone else's. However, as long as bones remained, thousands of years from now, DNA could easily be gotten from them.
Composting is really a great idea, and it's what happens to everyone that doesn't get cremated or buried in a titanium-alloy coffin. Being buried in a wood or steel coffin just postpones the composting for quite awhile, but eventually all those minerals are returned to nature. Cremating's one of the few things that dodges it, also having one's body shot into space or dropped into a volcano. And usually with the space burials, people get cremated first, to save on fuel costs. The body is just a temporary vessel anyway, and the body I'm using right now isn't even the same one I was using a couple of decades ago (most cells get replaced). Also I've used composting for all my victims for ages and it's worked like a charm. Um whoops ignore that last bit.
18
My Daddy's solution for overpopulation in the graveyard, was to bury folks standing up, in a thin cylinder with a pop top so on the last day they could just rise up to heaven. GRIN! I like the idea a bed of red clover or alfalfa but not the notion of 30 folks layered one on top of the other and then rotated. Perhaps deep cavity, stand up composting would work and once the process is complete, the compost can be exhumed and spread around and the hole filled again. Cheers!
4
Oh please. What appears to be an altruistic and environmentally friendly gesture is at root just a moneymaking opportunity dressed up in ecoconsciousness. That in itself is not a bad thing, but I suspect that an added bonus for Ms. Spade is the chance, with plausible deniability, to spit in the face of the religious, in particular, who typically believe that a human death and subsequent rituals ought to be more dignified. Yes, many people are repulsed by cremation too. I'm agnostic on all of this. I just don't believe that the agenda here is as altruistic as advertised.
7
This is ridiculous. The ONLY safe way, both for humanity and ecologically, is for the dead to be cremated.
If someone dies of cancer, why do we stick the cancer back in the ground?
If someone dies of cancer, why do we stick the cancer back in the ground?
4
Sure. Cancer's completely non-contagious, there is no possible way to transmit it to another person short of genetic splicing, which we can't really do with humans yet.
8
If we're nothing more than accidentally slightly more sophisticated animals, then this is for you, just don't compost in my front yard (unless its for a Halloween gag). For the rest of us, we'll continue to treat the human body with a little more respect.
12
It's hard for me to imagine anything more respectful than returning me in the form of nourishment for other living things to the earth which has nourished me for decades. When you're dead, you - the living, acting, emoting id are gone from the earth, and at most either your immortal soul lives on separately from your body - if the monotheist traditions have it right - or as I believe, you live on only in the work you have contributed to the betterment of the world and in your memory in the minds of those close to you. Neither would seem threatened by composting of your corpse, but even if that argument doesn't cut it, it's still hard to see how being eviscerated and pickled in formeldahyde, or burned to dust in a gas oven, is in any way more respectful of your mortal remains.
5
But you are correct, we are nothing more than slightly more sophisticated animals ...
And plenty of cash? The cost of commercial burial is absurd, unnecessary, predatory, wasteful, and disrepectful of the living. The dead are beyond such concerns. We all need to get past these primitive tribal issues and practices.
The Tibetans have had the sustainable green solutions for centuries.. all you need is passle of vultures. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_burial
8
The trouble is that vultures in South Asia are near extinction because they eat the corpses of animals that have been fed a variety of drugs and painkillers. I fear human bodies will be similarly 'polluted', given the medical treatments just prior to death. So, these 'sky burials' are a great idea but not if the result is extinction of carrion birds. The Zoroastrian community is facing problems because they too practice sky burial, but there are very few vultures to take care of all the remains.
What a relief that someone is finally experimenting with this concept. I have forwarded the article to my children - they already know my number 1 choice would be composting with worms - this would be even more eloquent.
9
I have seen 'nurse logs' in my walks through the forest. Sometimes I see a perfectly straight row of trees and realize that they were nurtured by a decomposing nurse log which has now totally disappeared.
So, when I die, I would be happy to simply 'log out.'
So, when I die, I would be happy to simply 'log out.'
28
Sections of cemeteries could be regarded and coffins can be stacked above one another. It might give new meaning to the term cemetery hill. In the end it may look like so many municipal land fills. After a millennia or so when becomes to high, it could be converted to a park or an urban ski resort, in colder climates of course.
I always like the idea of sharing my grave with the roots of a newly planted tree. Providing nourishment to a tree thus provide a sense permanence in death. It would also provide a home for birds and squirrels. However, I never thought I should wind up serving as fertilizer for a few bushels of tomatoes.
I always like the idea of sharing my grave with the roots of a newly planted tree. Providing nourishment to a tree thus provide a sense permanence in death. It would also provide a home for birds and squirrels. However, I never thought I should wind up serving as fertilizer for a few bushels of tomatoes.
1
Here in Floriduh it's legal to dump a body in 1,000 feet of ocean.
Planning on my friends wrapping me in chain and feeding the fishes.
Planning on my friends wrapping me in chain and feeding the fishes.
6
Glad there's an alternative. My choice was to hop off the stern of a cruise ship in the middle of a beautiful starlit night....no muss, no fuss, and plenty of creatures to help clean up afterward....as Nature intended.
7
How utilitarian! The first step toward soylent green. If bodies are good for composting, well.......
3
Do not forget burial at sea.
When I am dead, I want the fish fed.
When I am dead, I want the fish fed.
3
i'll be cremated. the ashes turned plant food will make happy tulips grow. unless i'll be too acidic.
1
Jews traditionally bury their dead wrapped in shrouds and placed in a simple wooden casket (the casket is made out of raw wood and nothing else -no nails, varnish, etc.) - Embalming is not permitted, and the casket is placed directly into the earth, not in a concrete vault. Therefore, it seems to me that the same basic process will occur to the body (i.e., rotting and decay) without this special composting process. It's an interesting idea regardless.
24
One of the first SF stories I read many years ago, involved a wealthy man who wanted to be buried on mankind's ancestral home, The Earth. Its the far future and Earth is one big cemetery. He was refused (not an Einstein, Shakespeare etc.), so being the owner of a fertilizer company, he arranged it so that he was cremated and his ashes placed in a bag used to keep cemetery grass green. The robot workers could care less about ...
31
Say, was that by Clifford Simak? Sounds like him, he's got some phenomenal far future science fiction ideas.
It could start a whole new industry, though. "Get your Grandpa's composting kit at WalMart".
I once bought an old wooden boat in Seattle from a guy who worked at a funeral home there. As we piloted the boat down Puget Sound at night to where I lived, I was astonished to see that he had barrels of human ashes aboard that were destined for dumping into the drink in Elliot Bay as per the deceased or their families' wishes. The ashes were in our noses and eyes as they poured them out. No families, no prayers or lives remembered. And I thought, woof! that's not very meaningful. I can only imagine the process that human composting would take.
I have come to value the ceremonies of life and death that have sustained people for centuries. I don't like the embalming process and would love to be buried in just a shroud (although, it is hot here in south Georgia and I doubt bodies keep well until the family assembled), but I don't want to deny my family the grieving and closure processes of ground burial.
I have come to value the ceremonies of life and death that have sustained people for centuries. I don't like the embalming process and would love to be buried in just a shroud (although, it is hot here in south Georgia and I doubt bodies keep well until the family assembled), but I don't want to deny my family the grieving and closure processes of ground burial.
24
Oh, I cannot help but remember Sophocles' Antigone--being killed solely to secure a decent burial for her brother, who was left on the ground unburied by his enemies. I can't help but thing that some sort of tradition, dignity, and honored place for family grief are really paramount in death.
1
So long as there's no chance of this compost being used in growing food that might end up being served to humans I'm all for it and might opt for it.
3
I can foresee one problem. It may be necessary to exclude deceased politicians from being composted. The amount of compressed hot air they would release could be explosive. Worse still if a bunch of them were composted together.
20
Composting people doesn't prevent their carbon from entering the atmosphere as greenhouse gases. It merely delays it. All organic matter is a temporary above ground reservoir of carbon that will eventually re-enter the atmosphere as CO2 through rapid combustion (e.g. forest fires, cremation) or slow combustion (e.g. digestion by an organism) unless it is permanently sequestered underground as solid carbon (e.g. fossilization, sea floor deposits of dead organisms, active sequestration of carbon by people).
4
I like composting better than any of the available alternatives (cremation, burial). Burial at sea would be nice too, but I think that is also pretty restrictive.
It's a great idea. I would like to see the laws be created now to make it a viable option for me. As earth's human population grows more people will be dying than ever before. Something more useful has to be done with human remains than is allowed by current cultural practices.
8
Why is manure ideal for composting animals but not humans? We are made of exactly the same elements. It is our insistence on believing that we are so superior to our fellow creatures that will continue to prevent us from enjoying a complete connection to our world.
13
I can think of no finer way to say goodbye to life than to return my physical remains to the ecosystem that created me. I made this wish clear to my family many years ago, and it is encouraging that it may be possible for them to honor this last request without running afoul of the law.
While it appears there are some who are shocked or offended by this concept; and have preconceived notions as to what constitutes respect for the dead, I would remind them that we live in a world where organized religions with lofty ideas as to what constitutes human dignity have been fighting with one and other for millennia , causing pain , suffering and debasement for anyone who dares call their spiritual practices into question. To be embraced by Mother Nature, quietly, softly, on Her own terms, and without arrogance is an ending , and a beginning, that I am comfortable with.
While it appears there are some who are shocked or offended by this concept; and have preconceived notions as to what constitutes respect for the dead, I would remind them that we live in a world where organized religions with lofty ideas as to what constitutes human dignity have been fighting with one and other for millennia , causing pain , suffering and debasement for anyone who dares call their spiritual practices into question. To be embraced by Mother Nature, quietly, softly, on Her own terms, and without arrogance is an ending , and a beginning, that I am comfortable with.
21
I'm not convinced. Talk about climate change. Can you imagine millions of human bodies decomposing slowly all over the world. And would not sturdy fences be needed around the compost heaps? Just asking.........
1
The objections are related to squeamishness, disgust of the body when it's not caring for itself anymore, and a rejection of natural processes. Though disturbing to some, who might consider being sealed and decomposing inside a wooden or metal box somehow more hygienic and socially acceptable, I find this idea a breath of fresh air, and it doesn't even smell bad.
4
Excellent path. Rational, practical. We need this. And recalls to mind Walt Whitman's "This Compost":
"Behold this compost! behold it well! Perhaps every mite has once formed part of a sick person--yet behold! The grass of spring covers the prairies. . . .
[The Earth]. . .gives such divine materials to men, and accepts such leavings from them at last."
"Behold this compost! behold it well! Perhaps every mite has once formed part of a sick person--yet behold! The grass of spring covers the prairies. . . .
[The Earth]. . .gives such divine materials to men, and accepts such leavings from them at last."
4
Human bodies need to be buried so that they can be resurrected when the Messiah comes.
11
But these bodies are buried. Just not in caskets.
4
Dear Crusader,
I'm going to try my best not to be offensive or sarcastic here. I find your comment somewhat foolish for a few reasons. First, there's no way people could use a body that had been buried for over a week or so again, it decomposes too much. Second, all bodies that have been buried ages ago are little more than partial skeletons. Third, resurrection being a miraculous process there'd be no reason to use the exact same skeleton anyway. Fourth, an all-powerful deity could not possibly be hampered by someone having been cremated or otherwise not-buried. Fifth, most of us no longer believe in the writings of fairly ignorant shepherds who died long before it was discovered the earth was not flat.
Sorry about all that, but basically, anyone who might be interested in composting remains would not be swayed by your line of reasoning.
I'm going to try my best not to be offensive or sarcastic here. I find your comment somewhat foolish for a few reasons. First, there's no way people could use a body that had been buried for over a week or so again, it decomposes too much. Second, all bodies that have been buried ages ago are little more than partial skeletons. Third, resurrection being a miraculous process there'd be no reason to use the exact same skeleton anyway. Fourth, an all-powerful deity could not possibly be hampered by someone having been cremated or otherwise not-buried. Fifth, most of us no longer believe in the writings of fairly ignorant shepherds who died long before it was discovered the earth was not flat.
Sorry about all that, but basically, anyone who might be interested in composting remains would not be swayed by your line of reasoning.
6
If you are buried, your body just decomposes a little slower. So there's nothing left either way eventually to be "resurrected."
4
I just e-mailed this article to my wife- who is younger than I am and will almost certainly outlive me- and asked that when the time is right, she do everything possible/available to use this type of final process. I could not agree with what they are proposing more. We are all small parts of the cosmic flow of this universe in birth, life and death.
3
Something like this or "green burial" is very attractive to me. In 1968 I took acid and was prone on the warm grass during a sunny day. I really felt the physical connection between my body and the organic processes going on underneath me, like I could just melt into the earth. It was a good feeling and I want something like that in real life. I'm going on 69, so I better get organized. I need to find something like this in California. You'd think it would be here first.
People think those boxes and liners and embalming will keep them preserved forever. But, anyone who is buried will eventually decompose, get eaten by bugs, and return to the earth. Seems to me that it is a good idea to do it faster, admitting what happens, without wasting thousands upon thousands of dollars on the whole process of denial.
143
The very though of "being preserved forever" seems morbid to me. Turning into compost sounds nice. Maybe even nicer than cremation and a million time better than the conventional burial.
Thanks for this article. I would like my body to be composted and hope their project can come to fruition before my time comes...
I just Googled this group and discovered that Kickstarter has a current campaign for the Urban Death Project. It expires in 30 days. I hope they reach their goal! I will be contributing....
I just Googled this group and discovered that Kickstarter has a current campaign for the Urban Death Project. It expires in 30 days. I hope they reach their goal! I will be contributing....
6
This form of burial is one step removed from the soylent green dystopia. I prefer to be mummified and then exhibited outside the graduate student library so I can frown at them in perpetuity as they rush in to do last minute work on their theses.
6
Please please please put me on your list. If this becomes reality, I want in. I'm willing to commit indefinitely.
3
If it weren't for today's date, I would have thought this was an April Fools' joke.
2
Hamlet, set by Yorick's unearthed skull to brooding on mortality, said 'imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay/May stop a hole to keep the wind away'. (Mulch ado about nothing?) and Laertes, as Ophelia is laid to rest, proclaims, 'from her fair and unpolluted flesh/May violets spring!'
More sentimentally, thwarted lovers turn to fruitful compost in the folk song 'Barbara Allen::
They buried Willie in the old churchyard,
And Barbara there anigh him,
And out of his grave grew a red, red rose,
And out of hers, a briar.
They grew and grew in the old churchyard,
Till they couldn't grow no higher,
They lapped and tied in a true love's knot.
The rose ran around the briar.
When asked what happens after you die, Madelyn Murray O'Hare, celebrated atheist, replied, 'you rot'. Sounds fine to me. When I'm done with my body, I'd be glad if they just left it somewhere to peaceably deliquiesce into worm food. If there is an omnipotent deity and a last judgement, I trust He will provide me with a body for the occasion.
More sentimentally, thwarted lovers turn to fruitful compost in the folk song 'Barbara Allen::
They buried Willie in the old churchyard,
And Barbara there anigh him,
And out of his grave grew a red, red rose,
And out of hers, a briar.
They grew and grew in the old churchyard,
Till they couldn't grow no higher,
They lapped and tied in a true love's knot.
The rose ran around the briar.
When asked what happens after you die, Madelyn Murray O'Hare, celebrated atheist, replied, 'you rot'. Sounds fine to me. When I'm done with my body, I'd be glad if they just left it somewhere to peaceably deliquiesce into worm food. If there is an omnipotent deity and a last judgement, I trust He will provide me with a body for the occasion.
1
tn already has a body farm: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_farm
1
my understanding is that meat is not good for composting-
KITCHEN COMPOST
Add a mixture of some or all of the following
ingredients:
vegetable peels and seeds
egg shells
fruit peels and seeds
nut shells
coffee grounds
any other vegetable or fruit scraps
Note: (Do not add meat scraps, bones, dairy
products, oils, or fat. They may attract pesty
animals.)
KITCHEN COMPOST
Add a mixture of some or all of the following
ingredients:
vegetable peels and seeds
egg shells
fruit peels and seeds
nut shells
coffee grounds
any other vegetable or fruit scraps
Note: (Do not add meat scraps, bones, dairy
products, oils, or fat. They may attract pesty
animals.)
4
I'm fine with tossing my body out for the pesty animals. Perhaps my last act could be providing a meal for a hungry bobcat or a wolf.
Morbid and revolting. I am sorry but this just completely wipes out the idea of death with dignity.
3
Sorry to break this to you, but death is always morbid, and the details of what happens during and after can easily be revolting. And it's next to impossible to die while standing and saluting the flag or in a similarly dignified pose.
1
How so? The bodies are dead. They are no more. They have shuffled off this mortal coil. Dying with dignity happens when you are not hooked up to machines, being force-fed, or otherwise forcibly kept alive in a hospital by doctors whose only desire is not to have you die on their watch. Have a nice memorial service for the dead person and let the body turn into a tree without contaminating the ground with toxic embalming chemicals.
Where do I sign up? Composting my body fits perfectly with my values and the life I have tried to live. I would be happy to know that my remains would be food for a tree. I don't want to go out in a burst of fossil fuel.
7
Why not go back to simple burials in the ground with no embalming or caskets. Oak trees or pines can be planted between several bodies and the land eventually used for growing timber.
4
Because humans are long-lived and at the top of the food-chain, our bodies absorb/retain substances that it doesn't make sense to reintroduce into the environment (if the idea is to spread this compost into a forest or farmland). Human tissue is an effective scavenger for metals (like mercury), fat-soluble pesticides (yes, we all have DDT in our tissue, even though DDT has not been used for decades), and other fat-soluble breakdown-resistant substances like PCBs. In other words, we're not even suitable to make good compost!
4
This is great. I'd love to be composted, but not necessarily along with other people. I'm kind of an introvert.
289
Just thinking the exact same thing.Thanks
1
Hilarious
It's a tightrope for sure. I think if you can find a way to be respectful of the dead than it sounds like a good thing. Nobody wants to be forgotten but many people think white washed, sanitary cemeteries are just strange and foreign. Some decorum must be observed though. I gotta admit that the way that this is presented in the title with the picture made my stomach turn. We need to maintain some dignity.
29
I can save you $2500. Take me out to oh, around 500 feet of ocean depth, appropriately weight me, and toss me in. Nature will handle the rest in short order.
149
@JW: Nice idea, but getting you out to 500 feet of ocean depth will still cost something, since the boat needs fuel to run its engine round-trip.
1
Brilliant! This is the solution I have been looking for.
Our new company 'OceanRest.com' will be swamped (sic) orders.
1
I have a comment and a question:
a) will the prions from Mad Cow Disease be killed? (I don't think so, since even cooking will not kill /destroy them in meat.) This is a problem if the soil from humans/cows becomes mixed in with food products.
b) Cremation is about $600 compared to $2,500 for this process. So, I guess I'm ok to cremate (which also takes care of comment #a).
http://funeralservicesnyc.com/cremation3.html
a) will the prions from Mad Cow Disease be killed? (I don't think so, since even cooking will not kill /destroy them in meat.) This is a problem if the soil from humans/cows becomes mixed in with food products.
b) Cremation is about $600 compared to $2,500 for this process. So, I guess I'm ok to cremate (which also takes care of comment #a).
http://funeralservicesnyc.com/cremation3.html
1
Where can I sign up?
4
Overly elaborate. Just place the unembalmed body in a hole in the ground and cover it. Nature will take care of the rest. Or follow Zoroastrian practice and allow vultures first to consume the flesh.
The way we do it now is toxic to the environment and just plain silly.
The way we do it now is toxic to the environment and just plain silly.
6
And your idea is overly simple. Where do you create these holes in the ground? How much land does that require?
I am sure there is a toxicity issue with human remains so, for now, until we can be assured that our better living through chemistry degrades as harmlessly and effectively as do we, I am against the idea.
I had wanted to be buried at sea (sans embalming) as a way of recycling into the food chain, but I like this idea so much better.
1
I love this !! For many years I have been saying I want to be composited. It rings great meaning to "Lou grew this broccoli".
Funerals and cemeteries are such a waste, they are illogical and just part of our hanging on to superstitions or worse....adjustments to war.
Funerals and cemeteries are such a waste, they are illogical and just part of our hanging on to superstitions or worse....adjustments to war.
1
All I ask is: Please do not invite me to dinner at your house......
Cremate and then add ashes to compost.
1
I'm there when the time comes. Yet another reason I love Seattle and the way we think outside the box around here...sorry, the pun abuse was too obvious!
14
I'd love to push up the sweet peas (far) under my garden, but the state mandates all this nonsense before home burials.
One word. NO.
6
Dear Paul Hewson,
That's fine but keep in mind, standard burial is just delayed composting, so it'll happen anyway.
That's fine but keep in mind, standard burial is just delayed composting, so it'll happen anyway.
Has anyone considered the possibility that this practice will introduce human pathogens into the soil? The soil is where many pathogens, including the Plague bacterium, reside between their periodic outbreaks. Previously unheard-of diseases make the headlines when their remote habitats are visited by civilization, and the organisms visit civilization in return.
But I am also reminded of the words Cleopatra tossed at Julius Caesar in the 1963 movie -- "We build monuments to our dead, and you burn yours like garbage."
But I am also reminded of the words Cleopatra tossed at Julius Caesar in the 1963 movie -- "We build monuments to our dead, and you burn yours like garbage."
6
Actually, yes, they have considered it. The article says there are medical issues to be considered.
There is something a little, just a little, insensitive here. Mass graves are often associated with the holocaust and other forms of genocide. Maybe this could be an option for those who choose it for themselves, but the presentation of this idea needs to be aware and respectful of history.
8
IN DEAD EARNEST
If I should die before I wake,
All my bone and sinew take
Put me in the compost pile
To decompose me for a while.
Worms, water, sun will have their way,
Returning me to common clay
All that I am will feed the trees
And little fishes in the seas.
When radishes and corn you munch,
You may be having me for lunch
And then excrete me with a grin,
Chortling, "There goes Lee again."
'Twill be my happiest destiny
To die and live eternally.
Words by Lee Hays (1979) Music by Pete Seeger (1979)
(c) 1981, 1982 by Sanga Music Inc.
If I should die before I wake,
All my bone and sinew take
Put me in the compost pile
To decompose me for a while.
Worms, water, sun will have their way,
Returning me to common clay
All that I am will feed the trees
And little fishes in the seas.
When radishes and corn you munch,
You may be having me for lunch
And then excrete me with a grin,
Chortling, "There goes Lee again."
'Twill be my happiest destiny
To die and live eternally.
Words by Lee Hays (1979) Music by Pete Seeger (1979)
(c) 1981, 1982 by Sanga Music Inc.
11
Awesome. Pete and Lee would love the reference.
At his request, Lee Hays was cremated and his ashes spread in his and his friends' gardens.
"Behold this compost! Behold it well!
...
Now I am terrified at the Earth! it is that calm and patient,
It grows such sweet things out of such corruptions..."
-- Walt Whitman, "This Compost"
...
Now I am terrified at the Earth! it is that calm and patient,
It grows such sweet things out of such corruptions..."
-- Walt Whitman, "This Compost"
3
Bring out your dead!
7
I would like to have my remains placed on a scaffold in the foothills of the Himalayas to be eaten by vultures. Seriously. Unfortunately a) humans have destroyed the vulture populations through our pollution and more importantly, b) my wife is not the sort of person who would travel to the Himalayas with me while I'm alive, much less with my body after I'm dead. However, if my wife precedes me in death it is very likely that I will arrange to spend my last days in the Himalayas, and if possible try to get someone to scaffold my remains.
17
The vulture populations have plummeted due to the drugs fed to cattle and other animals whose dead bodies vultures cleaned up. I fear that human bodies are similarly contaminated and would kill whatever consumed them.
Otherwise, I am with you. Zoroastrians, and Tibetan Buddhists all allow 'sky burials' where bodies are fed to the birds as an ultimate act of charity. I think it's a great idea. Otherwise this composting also seems like a good idea, if our corpses are not too polluted with the drugs pumped into us in our last days.
Otherwise, I am with you. Zoroastrians, and Tibetan Buddhists all allow 'sky burials' where bodies are fed to the birds as an ultimate act of charity. I think it's a great idea. Otherwise this composting also seems like a good idea, if our corpses are not too polluted with the drugs pumped into us in our last days.
Sounds good but transferring your body to the Himalayas would be so energy inefficient and cause more pollution than being buried in the USA
I'm glad people want to get away from the toxicity resulting from embalming but composting in this day and age might be a problem. Dental fillings, certainly, would be right up there but what about titanium joints, broken bones with pins surgically implanted, plates in war vets' skulls, heart pacemakers, and, inevitably, digital devices yet to be invented? Seems to me that cremation and filtering the ashes might indeed be environmentally acceptable, especially in parts of the country where concentrated solar could be used as a heat source. With the mega-droughts forecast by the second half of this century, I would expect there to be plenty of places available in the West and Plains areas of the country for that.
38
As I reported elsewhere, if I could compost a 10-pound raccoon with the most primitive means, then there is no doubt human cadavers can be completely composted using proper co-materials, moisture and temperature control. Every recycler already deals with removing heavy metals, etc.
This has long been the practice in Germany. Graves are "rented" for a specific period that is determined by the one who purchases it. The body is contained within a wooden coffin and is not embalmed. After the period that has been purchased ends, the gravestone is dug up and disposed of and the grave is used again. None of the Christian graveyards in Germany operates differently. One can choose to purchase a grave in perpetuity. But this is extremely rare. Time spans of 15-20 years are the norm. That is why you can find piles of inscribed tombstones often lying around in one part of the graveyard.
118
No surprise this is in Germany!!
@Robin: How unappealing.
This makes sense. After the people who knew you have gone, why should your little plot still be there? No one cares any more.
1
I can't say that this appeals to me, but more power to Ms. Spade! I plan to be cremated, BTW -- no formaldehyde and slow decay for me.
26
I think this is a great idea! The modern funeral - pickled with hazardous chemicals and sealed in a watertight metal box - seems ridiculous to me.
The article notes that cremation releases greenhouse gases, but I assume composting does as well. I am curious as to which of the two processes would be considered more eco-friendly.
The article notes that cremation releases greenhouse gases, but I assume composting does as well. I am curious as to which of the two processes would be considered more eco-friendly.
84
Cremation uses natural gas as a fuel to generate the heat required, so I'm guessing it would have the larger CO2 footprint.
1
Composting does also release greenhouse gases, but over a slower time frame, and possibly fewer gases overall. Cremation releases the gases almost all at once and futher includes the release from the fuel used to do the burning.
Composting would add almost nothing in comparison to the time and high heat needed to cremate. I have a tree on my property that I would like to be buried under. It would give me great pleasure to know I was adding to the life of that tree.
1
Lee Hays, an original member of the folksong group, The Weavers, wanted to be turned into compost upon his death. He and Pete Seeger wrote a song about it, "In Dead Earnest," in 1979 (words by Lee Hays, music by Pete Seeger):
IN DEAD EARNEST
If I should die before I wake,
All my bone and sinew take
Put me in the compost pile
To decompose me for a while.
Worms, water, sun will have their way,
Returning me to common clay
All that I am will feed the trees
And little fishes in the seas.
When radishes and corn you munch,
You may be having me for lunch
And then excrete me with a grin,
Chortling, "There goes Lee again."
'Twill be my happiest destiny
To die and live eternally.
IN DEAD EARNEST
If I should die before I wake,
All my bone and sinew take
Put me in the compost pile
To decompose me for a while.
Worms, water, sun will have their way,
Returning me to common clay
All that I am will feed the trees
And little fishes in the seas.
When radishes and corn you munch,
You may be having me for lunch
And then excrete me with a grin,
Chortling, "There goes Lee again."
'Twill be my happiest destiny
To die and live eternally.
105
There is no end end to the frightening and super scary sci-fi fantasies of American progressives. Reading this article, I had visions of the Nazi's mass graves. Imagine your mother or father, or your child transformed into "manure" and let's see how far this idea gets.
7
To me this is repulsive. Would I want to eat something which contains the remnants of a loved one? Don't think so. We revere and honour our dead. Not throw them into a heap to compost. We do that with garbage. People? No!
How about being transformed into a wizened bag of bones...mummified for all eternity or until the cemetery goes out of business. I like the "manure" idea better....
1
A mulch improved option for sure. (Sorry.)
29
Thank you for this forward thinking and Green sustainable article. Let's face it..this is probably the future albeit cultural norms may be reticent to the thought. I'm thinking this is the way for may transition and will be informing my children at the appropriate time and age. Hey...my grandfather was a farmer. What a way to be useful to the delicate cycle we all call LIFE.
8
Just curious - why are you capitalizing "Green"? That lends some truth to the view that for some environmentalism has become a religion.
Good grief.
Is there no level to which human stupidity does not reach?
Is there no level to which human stupidity does not reach?
1
Our quasi-Egyptian funerary practices are what are looney. The pretense that you can preserve the body indefinitely springs from the superstitious conviction that when/if there is a resurrection, God will need all the parts. Medieval theologians, e.g., Aquinas, actually cracked their brains over what would happen at the last trump to a man who'd been eaten by cannibals.
1
Well, I agree with your first sentence.
1
You're referring to the current approach of embalming/burying promoted by the funeral industry, right? If so, I agree it's pretty stupid.
2
Terrific idea. Faced with the prospect of being embalmed, thrown into a casket and lowered into a concrete vault, being crisped at 2000 degrees or becoming one with nature I would pick the later. Although as Ellen asked; are we really non-toxic enough to be environmentally safe?
15
Soylent Green is people! The group-churning together of loved ones' remains is going to be a tough sell.
2
I can see the looks on the faces of horrified children, refusing to eat their garden veggies, because grandma's in it.
19
Hallelujah! As somebody who loves the outdoors, I've long wished my body could replenish the earth after I die.
53
Those considering this should also consider the Body Farm at the University of Tennessee. Forensic anthropologists lay out the bodies of generous donors to be exposed to the elements and study natural decomposition and the work of predators and insects. The information gathered through this process is invaluable to science and forensic work. Nothing could be more natural or more fulfilling than to know that even after death one is contributing to the betterment of humanity. Information on the Body Farm can be found at
http://fac.utk.edu/donation.html
http://fac.utk.edu/donation.html
19
Macabre. But possibly effective. I wonder if they are looking for nominees to join the new trend? I have several in mind. Including me.........
Sorry. This is a little looney.
2
Burying people in metal boxes so they rot slowly is a little loony.
14
Looney? looney is injecting a body full of formaldehyde and making it look 'natural', before placing it in a horrendously expensive coffin and putting it in a concrete box in the ground.
1
Compared to what, being placed in a casket and placed in the ground where you eventually become, ahem, compost? Being incinerated and your ashes spread where they become, ahem, compost? Sorry, we are dirt one way or another, its all in one's head.
4
I say 'why not'? Everything ends up in the ground eventually. And let's face it...funeral homes are just in it to make money off of grieving families...'guilting' them into buying fancy boxes which are destined to go into the ground, silly hair and makeup work which just makes the deceased look worse, headstones, flowers, etc. Just an utter waste of money. Better to simply have a small gathering where everyone can celebrate the person's life, and then dispose of the body as simply as possible.
43
Fabulous idea! We are part of the circle of life and need to acknowledge that we have been causing great harm by our stubborn disconnect.
I cringe with horror at the thought of being buried in a plastic casket with shiny gold trim after being pumped full of formaldehyde. No way! If my weary dust can grow a milkweed that nurtures a monarch butterfly, well, my life will be a success!
I cringe with horror at the thought of being buried in a plastic casket with shiny gold trim after being pumped full of formaldehyde. No way! If my weary dust can grow a milkweed that nurtures a monarch butterfly, well, my life will be a success!
111
Let us all watch Soylent Green once again.
3
"Finally make yourself useful."
4
I hate to shock the Scientifically illiterate, which of course means 99% of the public, but human composting releases the same amount of greenhouse gases as cremation using the same quantity of wood as in the composing wood chips. The only difference is how quickly the carbon dioxide is released. And BTW, both the body & the wood are intrinsically carbon neutral.
The issue here is with the removal of nutrient-rich organic matter from the food chain; with the toxic chemicals, such as formaldehyde; and with the taking of land for the utterly ridiculous purpose of in-ground burial of 'preserved' bodies in sealed boxes.
Consider: In-ground burial was not an option in soggy New Orleans for much of its history. So, if you check out the 'ovens' and 'society tombs' (not 'hoity-toity'; mutual aid societies) of the New Orleans cemeteries and how they work, you will find the bodies are allowed to decompose. The bones are collected when room is needed for new occupants.
Here are links to this tradition, which is still, for some, in use.
http://www.examiner.com/article/uncovering-the-truth-about-above-ground-...
http://www.thecarpetbagger.org/2012/11/the-strangest-things-you-can-find...
http://paigepixel.hubpages.com/hub/Unique-New-Orleans-Burial-Customs-Soc...
Consider: In-ground burial was not an option in soggy New Orleans for much of its history. So, if you check out the 'ovens' and 'society tombs' (not 'hoity-toity'; mutual aid societies) of the New Orleans cemeteries and how they work, you will find the bodies are allowed to decompose. The bones are collected when room is needed for new occupants.
Here are links to this tradition, which is still, for some, in use.
http://www.examiner.com/article/uncovering-the-truth-about-above-ground-...
http://www.thecarpetbagger.org/2012/11/the-strangest-things-you-can-find...
http://paigepixel.hubpages.com/hub/Unique-New-Orleans-Burial-Customs-Soc...
22
Not when you take into account the energy required to heat/pulverize the body during cremation (assuming the grid is powered by a greenhouse gas emitting source, like most are)...
1
If it works and is done correctly, I think this is something that I would do. I've never liked the idea of my corpse being in a box. I like the idea of going back into the earth, being part of it again.
3
It worked well for the Mafia. And did not affect the state forests.
Aside from the lack of a marker of any kind, (plaque on the fence perhaps), what do you do with the bones? They do not decompose.
1
From "Joe Hill's Last Will"
My body, oh, if I could choose
I would to ashes it reduce
And let the merry breezes blow
My dust to where some flowers grow.
My body, oh, if I could choose
I would to ashes it reduce
And let the merry breezes blow
My dust to where some flowers grow.
9
Excellent. Sign me up. On our 40 wooded acres we have been using 'sky burial' for our pets for years... including our beloved 130 lb mastiff. Yes, there will be maggots, but wrens and several phoebes raised their young on the bounty. I took comfort in the thought that part of my dear Megadog had in a small way taken wing and was with us still.
25
Very good thought! But I endorse the concept. At last a way to make us "useful" to the planet...
1
It's surprising that this is such a novel idea. Everything that was once alive will rot and return to the soil. I'd like to be able to have myself put into our own compost pile when I die. It would be a lot cheaper than the $2500.
14
And your family's vegetable garden would prosper.....
Be certain funeral directors will oppose your right to dispose of your body without paying them. Funeral directors are the lowest of the low.
1
Also, many areas have laws covering the disposal of bodies. (I wrote a paper on this for seminary years ago.) Idea fine except that animals easily sniff out and dig up anything that is not deeply buried. I would not like to think of someone I had just carefully said good-bye to being chewed up by wild dogs during the night.
I'm really excited about the potential for this project and its ability to replicate beyond Seattle and across the country (even the world!). If you're interested in learning more, check out the Kickstarter campaign: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/546469190/the-urban-death-project-l...
1
When you're dead, you're dead. What happens afterward really does not matter. I kind of like composting better than getting thrown on the municipal dump.
9
Well, out of respect for your descendants, who would tend and determine the current decomposing status?
Ah...."Brave New World"! We can still be useful after we are gone.
1
I like the idea, but do have concerns about prions and other pathogens, such as spore-formers, Prions are the most difficult to deal with. Perhaps testing would need to be done to determine if a person were afflicted with a prion disease such as Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease, even though they might be asymptomatic at the time of death. Human composting needs to be examined from many different angles and regulations established so there are not unintended consequences.
4
I can't resist the joke that some of us are already compost long before we hit the cemetery. And yes, I have a couple politicians in mind...
4
We are talking physical, not mental. Else there would be few politicians left.......
I've never understood the desire to have one's corpse pumped full of preservative like a biology class frog and then interred in a box to keep it separate from the earth. Cremation is preferable to that; at least your body is being recycled and it doesn't occupy any real estate. Composting is certainly another option; in reality, it is no different from how countless numbers of our ancestors ended up, so why should we be squeamish about it?
330
We developed rituals of respect for human bodies over many thousands or tens of thousands of years.
Maybe creative people should consider that before they just up and change everything and make us into a mulch pile.
Let alone all of the creepy Holocaust-inducing imagery of quotes in this article like, "..perhaps dental fillings would have to be removed from bodies..."
Maybe creative people should consider that before they just up and change everything and make us into a mulch pile.
Let alone all of the creepy Holocaust-inducing imagery of quotes in this article like, "..perhaps dental fillings would have to be removed from bodies..."
48
Actually, from what I gathered from the article, many rituals were developed surprisingly recently.
8
As to your Holocaust comparison, actually, Jewish tradition is somewhat closer to this, in that although it requires the body be handled with respect, it shuns our elaborate funerary rituals of embalming etc. and buries the deceased promptly, wrapped in a simple shroud, with a simple coffin (or none at all).
I don't see anything creepy or remotely Nazi about it. It's our modern traditions that are, far from being 'tens of thousands of years' old, creepy and newfangled. It brings to mind Lenin in his glass coffin ... or Snow White.
If anything, we want to return to the tradition of respect, not have our families go into debt and squander our life savings on potlatch displays of conspicuous consumption in which we are made into macabre dolls.
I don't see anything creepy or remotely Nazi about it. It's our modern traditions that are, far from being 'tens of thousands of years' old, creepy and newfangled. It brings to mind Lenin in his glass coffin ... or Snow White.
If anything, we want to return to the tradition of respect, not have our families go into debt and squander our life savings on potlatch displays of conspicuous consumption in which we are made into macabre dolls.
188
'rituals of respect'....one person's form of 'respect' is another person's silliness.
Either way, most of these forms of 'respect' were created by religions and/or those looking to make a profit in others' time of grief.
What about respect for Mother Earth?
Either way, most of these forms of 'respect' were created by religions and/or those looking to make a profit in others' time of grief.
What about respect for Mother Earth?
10
I've always wanted to be buried without a casket, with an acorn on my chest. This sounds better. Where do I sign up?
273
Actually, I like the acorn thing better. And less labor intensive--plant once and be done.
4
I don't know whether the project will do that much for climate change, but I love the idea of being turned into soil, and so have donated a little money to Katrina Spade's research. Google "Urban Death Project" and "Kickstarter" to find out more.
3
I love the acorn on the chest!
2
I live in a beautiful but desolate area of Oregon, where we buried our treasured dog. Knowing he's composting, we think of him during every season change. We now enjoy a deep and abiding connection to our property — it's no longer a real estate investment. Adding our family in this manner could only unify our ever-visible Milky Way, our spring flowers, and our fall leaves. An everlasting living memorial, if ever there was one.
234
A beautiful thought, until the property is sold.
We have our "Boo" garden which I send pictures to my son every spring to remind him how much we loved that dog.
Lovely idea… one question though.. Are we modern humans non-toxic enough to make healthy compost?
109
Conversely, have we eaten so many preservatives over our lifetimes that we don't really need to be embalmed?
4
Only if you are not a vegetarian......
1
Dust to dust becomes prophetic, it just takes a little longer .
34
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
Fascinating article, but would like to see some more information on the relative sustainability of cremation vs. composting. Does cremation really release a significant amount of greenhouse gases? It seems to me if you've used a wood-fueled fireplace a few times in your life it would be silly to avoid cremation on that basis.
4
Cremation uses a lot more fossil fuel than you'd think: about 600 million pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually – that’s the equivalent of more than 70,000 cars driving the road for a year.
2
Greenhouse gases are turning into an absurd obsession. Day to day life of 9 billion people, massive coal use by China and India, are examples of things that are going to have impact on greenhouse gases. Worrying about someone getting cremated or buried strikes me as obsessive-compulsive. Its a free country, if someone wants to be turned into compost upon death they surely have that right. But suggesting we are going to stop climate change with this is over the top and it should not be forced on anyone.
87
There are some who care deeply about their impact on this planet during their lifetimes and afterward. It would make me happy to know that my last act would be not to make any more contributions to greenhouse gas, no matter how small.
7
Sign me on.
39
Forget the mass grave approach--it will NEVER have the same appeal to Americans as a simple burial with a single body.
Also, why does it have to turn into useable compost so soon? It sounds like industrial ag. Let it sit with the spirits for awhile--no need to rush this transition either.
The idea of being buried up the hill under the big maple tree where the cows rest has always been my preference. The ultimate being one with Everything.
Also, why does it have to turn into useable compost so soon? It sounds like industrial ag. Let it sit with the spirits for awhile--no need to rush this transition either.
The idea of being buried up the hill under the big maple tree where the cows rest has always been my preference. The ultimate being one with Everything.
48
As for mass graves; no worse than mass transit. I think the law in most states won't let you be buried under your favorite tree....and you might have to have a casket and all the fixin's as well as a sop to the burial industry.
14
As I understand the law here in Vermont, my wife will call the local medical person to certify that I died naturally (tho if she poisons me, it's no more than I deserve, and I hope she gets away with it!) Then my sons will dig a grave up on the hill, and knock the shelves out of my casket (Yes--I built a rather crude box, and we've stood it on end, and put shelves in it--it's a distinctive book case at the moment!), and haul it all up on the hill, and bury me. Then a sketch of the grave location will be given to the town clerk, just for record keeping's sake (not everyone wants a body on the back 40).
The sooner the better.... things aren't improving in the wider world!
The sooner the better.... things aren't improving in the wider world!
4
I like the idea, I hope it takes off around the country.
73
Where do I sign?
42
this is great...and long overdue. let's do this!~!!
56
Sounds perfect to me. I would love to be composted and thrown under a tree. Being buried in a concrete vault and a wooden coffen ultimately gives the same result but takes centuries.
52
This is a logical and sustainable option for us humans and for the planet. And it is infinitely more palatable than Soylent Green. Sign me up.
65
Soylent Green is an even more efficient form of recycling that would benefit humans and the environment (no intermediate steps!), but we're not quite there yet. Give it another few decades.
2
I dunno. As I recall, Soylent Green was easier to swallow and digest.......
My father is a lifelong gardener who made a special trip from our old house to the new one to move his compost pile in the back of his pickup. He has always said that he would much prefer to be buried there than drenched in chemicals and stuck in a cemetery where no one would ever come visit. At least in the compost pile he'd know I'd be out there every day or two with the banana peels and coffee grounds.
159
And probably have the largest vegetables in town. If that is your bag, so to speak.
1