There is a common saying that “only two things in life are certain, death and taxes.” In her 2003 New York Times bestselling novel, Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, Mary Roach explores the former through twelve gripping chapters that range from the exhumation of the recently deceased to crash testing performed by automotive companies. Stiff is an account of Roach’s journey into the taboo question of “what happens to our bodies after we die?” Her central argument comes from the experiences that she has uncovering all of the ways bodies are, and have been, used to advance science and humankind. She wants cadavers to be recognized for their contributions to science. Additionally, she dedicates a chapter to discussing what she would …show more content…
Making use of her incredible journalism, and at times, drop-dead humor, Roach keeps her audience entertained throughout. In an interview, she was asked if she considered herself a scientific journalist, she declines, stating “I do not know as much as a scientist, but I sure am as curious as one” Her personal approach to her investigation made this book both entertaining and informative. Her curiosity shines through and makes this book real. She asks the awkward questions (and there are plenty of them) so the reader does not have to. In terms of this books relation to Alchemy to the Atom Bomb, this story touches on topics visited in class on numerous occasions, notably the role of the scientist, jokes in nature, and the invisible …show more content…
This is in reference to the body snatching observed in the late 18th and early 19th centuries by anatomists condemned from practicing dissection in the view of the public eye. Gangs of men, known as “resurrectionists,” would dig up hundreds of bodies and sell them to anatomists. These anatomists would then use these bodies for experimentation. The reason these otherwise upstanding citizens committed these acts was perhaps best explained by Sir Astley Cooper, an anatomist who is famous for saying “He must mangle the living if he has not operated on the dead.” I found this reasoning to be strikingly similar to the reasoning of the aforementioned medical anatomy lab at UCSF. While Cooper may have been well intentioned, it is unmistakable that he was hiring workers to do wicked deeds. Roach mentions that these workers were oftentimes assistants in the anatomist’s lab. This reminded me of Steven Shapin’s essay, The Invisible Technician. Despite the infamy associated with this practice, there is no question that real science was being performed, and discoveries were being made. So, as historians reflecting on these discoveries, is it unfair to only credit the anatomist for the findings that were made? Or do those that made the dissections possible by supplying the bodies deserve credit? Taking this one step further, are
Without them, we would be decades behind because the average person would not find signing away a piece of their body acceptable. Skloot brings up a case where a man sues a scientist for doing research on his removed spleen without his consent. The author states that those in favor of research said it “…would ‘create chaos for reseachers’ and ‘[sound] the death kneel to the university physician-scientist’. They called it ‘a threat to the sharing of tissue for research purposes,’ and worried that patients would block the progress of science by holding out for excessive profits, even with cells that weren’t worth millions…” (203). The concern shown from the quote was that with extensive limitations on research and tight ethical codes, the information found would be inadequate at best. On one hand, you do need to be honest with the patient, but for the cost of so many lives, there needs to be a balance of creating breakthroughs and appeasing those who matter in the situation. In regards to Henrietta, she did sign a document to have any medical procedure done that was deemed necessary by her doctors. With that being said, she did unknowingly give away some of her rights as a
Brown took her time to interview people and look through archives to get the raw scenery of what happened behind closed doors. The third part was “The Plutonium Disasters.” She brought light to how dangerous it was to work and live there, and most of the people in the camp did not know how it can affect their body. Dr. Herbert Parker, the head of the Health Physics Division, “estimated there were eight hundred million flakes of [plutonium], which, if sucked into workers’ lungs or [ingested], could lodge in soft organs and remain in the body of years, a tiny time bomb that Parker feared would produce cancer” (Brown 166). This radioactive element that workers are producing is not just affecting the environment, but is also affecting the workers and their families. Brown has given an immense amount of evidence to explain to the readers how it affected so many of the workers’ health; she gives a vivid picture of how the radioactivity and particles of plutonium lingers in the air. The affects to the workers and their family ranges from cancerous cells to organ deterioration, when a pregnant woman is exposed to it, the health of her baby is also at risk. The fourth and last part of the book is “Dismantling the Plutonium Curtain,” this curtain is the curtain of secrecy. Brown interviewed people who lived in the camps as children and also people who worked there. Many of the people she
Yearly, thousands die from not receiving the organs needed to help save their lives; Anthony Gregory raises the question to why organ sales are deemed illegal in his piece “Why legalizing organ sales would help to save lives, end violence”, which was published in The Atlantic in November of 2011. Anthony Gregory has written hundreds of articles for magazines and newspapers, amongst the hundreds of articles is his piece on the selling of organs. Gregory states “Donors of blood, semen, and eggs, and volunteers for medical trials, are often compensated. Why not apply the same principle to organs? (p 451, para 2)”. The preceding quote allows and proposes readers to ponder on the thought of there being an organ
We all know that living is an expensive experience. You’re required to pay taxes, pay for food, and pay for shelter. The counterpart of living, however, can also be quite expensive. In fact, Death is one of the most profitable events in life generating about 15 billion dollars a year (Qtd. In Crawford). With profit, however, comes greed and the Mortuary business has it’s fair share of corruption. Although a profit is necessary to maintain a business the extent to which some morticians go to maximize their profits is disgusting. While laws that Morticians must follow exist, their lack of enforcement renders them useless. That being said, these issues need to be addressed and solved.
... pricing organs like vultures, holding a great deal of disrespect to both the deceased as well as their families. In addition, the author fails to remain neutral when discussing the issue, and exaggerates in blaming the government, solely and entirely.
“Death's Acre” tells about the career of a forensic hero, Dr. Bill Bass, creator of the famous "Body Farm" at the University of Tennessee-the world's only research facility devoted to studying human decomposition. He tells about his life and how he became an anthropoligist. He tells about the Lindbergh kidnapping and murder, explores the mystery of a headless corpse whose identity surprised police.
In fear that Nazi Germany was developing an atomic bomb, on December 6 1941, scientists, engineers and the army raced to build the first man-made atomic bomb. These combined efforts provide the United States with wartime military advantage was dubbed ‘The Manhattan Project’. However, when by late 1944, concrete intelligence confirmed that Germany’s work on atomic weaponry had basically stalled in 1942, many scientists were given cause to pause and reassess their commitment to the project. Joseph Rotblat, for instance, quit the project maintaining that, ‘the fact that the German effort was stillborn undermined the rationale for continuing’. Indeed, he was the exception. Nevertheless, the scientists’ apprehensions reached a high plateau when Germany surrendered in May 1945. These events, among others, suggested that the bomb would be used, if at all, against Japan (a reversal, in a way, of the racism and genocide issues within Germany). Many scientists, thus, began to debate among themselves the moral and ethical implications of using an atomic bomb in the war and the fate of humanity in the imminent atomic age. In doing so, the scientists with a stronger sense of responsibility, resolved that, as they had created the bomb, they possessed both the legitimacy and intellect to formulate proposals regarding its use. On their political mission, the scientists fastened...
Human decomposition can be studied in different sets. In chapter three, Mary Roach shows us many dead body are being used to study human decomposition. Dead bodies have different stages of decay, by observing the different stages of the decomposition, the researchers record changes of the dead body through time. Scientists place the dead body into different environment, because not only the factors that causes a person die that makes the body shows different phases of decomposition, “Decay is highly dependent on environmental and situational factors.” (pg 40, chapter 3) Mary Roach sees a dead body with a sweatpant on, so that the researchers can study the effect of decay of a body that are wearing clothing. In reality, it helps investigators determine the time of death of cadavers, which helps them to solve crime and murder
Technology has allowed for the furtherance of warfare, from the invention of gun powder to the splitting of the atom. These findings have propelled the leap of numerous nations’ in the ability to wage war against each other. Of these discoveries, the splitting atom spawned an invention that would hurl the world from conventional warfare into the nuclear age. These ideals were the brainstorming of some of the greatest minds in America and abroad. These scientists began to formulate the creation of the atomic bomb, a device that would change the world in ways that had never been imagined before.
Chapter 6: Mary Roach explains the use of cadavers for weapon experiments. Although it was sometimes ineffective for evidence evaluation scientist replaced them with animals such as pigs to receive better data. Changes like these were made to have more efficient experiments and have easier removal.
The theoretical physicist Albert Einstein once declared, “The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge, but imagination.” In order to be successful, one must know that intelligence is not the wealth of knowledge gained, rather, it is creativity, which is accurate. J. Robert Oppenheimer was an American theoretical physicist who lived in the early 20th century and was plagued with problems like dysentery and design failure. J. Robert Oppenheimer created the atomic bomb with a team of scientists to overcome the problem of nuclear fission. Oppenheimer innovated a functional plutonium bomb and a uranium bomb, illuminating the physics world forever by authoring the first atomic bombs. (Allman, 2005).
Dear fellows , life can be short for a person, it only weights as a tiny pinch of dust among the entire universe, and we only have approximate twenty years of growth, but we have to pay the rest of our life preparing for death. Our bones will once become fragile, our skin will gradually become loose, our eyes will fade away the childhood light, and our cells, organs, and tissues will also steadily degenerate. However, as we are still alive, our life is meaningful, every little piece of you can be worthwhile. Don’t believe? Let me list some possibilities, a sample of hair or a piece of fingernail could be a crucial evidence in a case ( for example, in the movie Gattaca, all the storylines were brought up from antagonist's eyelash); it might be sound gross, but the truth is that your faeces are the best nutrient for plants in order for you to consume in the future; even your breath can contribute to the entire oxygen and carbon cycle! So what are you guys waiting for? What we are looking for is how to make our life significant, and we
Imagine yourself as a mortician, certified as an embalmer, retort operator, funeral director, and a funeral cosmetologist. You get a call late at night, there’s been a terrible accident and someone has died. You arrive at the hospital and are directed to a small room where the body of the deceased is being held. There’s blood all over the sheets as the doctor and coronary assistant zip up the body bag and inform you the body was badly mangled in a car accident, which is going to make reconstructing the deceased very difficult. Your assistant puts the body on the stretcher and loads it into the hearse while you talk to the wife of the deceased man. She tells you they plan to have a funeral so you give her your card and a reassuring word before leaving the hospital and driving back to the funeral home. Now your job begins, not only will you have to reconstruct this man’s disfigured body, but you must meet with the family, discuss funeral arrangements, and deal with the family’s emotional trauma that comes with losing a loved one. Although working in the funeral business can be emotionally draining, it’s a satisfying feeling to see mourning families able to say goodbye to their loved ones. Despite the fact that working so closely with the deceased can be chilling, Mortuary science can be a thrilling field to work in.
This book largely details the experiences of the scientist, Nikolaus Riehl, who spent 10 years as a captive of the Soviet Union. He worked on the production of pure uranium for the Soviet nuclear bomb program. This relates to the topic of Human Beings and Their Control Over Nature with respect to the production of nuclear weapons.
I have often wondered why people went through so much time and money disposing of dead bodies. Once the person dies, I seriously doubt that they care what happens to their body. In the past, bodies have been put to rest many different ways. Cultures have a large effect on this. Some cultures would burn the body or hang them up high so the spirits could be released. Nevertheless, I have only found three legal ways to dispose of a dead body in the United States today.