SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
With an upcoming bill, Washington state might be able to start composting dead people. The bill aims to legalize composting human remains and the heat generated by natural microbes should bring the pile up to 55°C for 72 hours, which is hot enough to kill key pathogens.
The method is called “recomposting” and claims to be cheaper and more environmentally friendly than traditional burial or cremation. It involves rapidly decomposing a body and converting the remains into soil. That nutrient-rich material can then be used to grow trees, flowers, and other new life.
The alternative practice hinges on a bill that state senator Jamie Pedersen plans to introduce next month, according to NBC. It would legalize recomposting in Washington where burial and cremation are currently the only acceptable ways to dispose of human remains.
Composting was prominent in the Larry Niven / Jerry Pournelle science fiction novel, Footfall. However, the discussion in Washington was initiated by Katrina Spade in 2013 while working on her master’s in architecture at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @05:32AM (12 children)
The article does not explain what happens to the bones. As everyone knows, they are not biodegradable, being inorganic. But there is organic matter inside the bones. They also will be "removing" (???) artificial hips and, presumably, dental implants, pumps, pacemakers, shunts, screws, plates - whatever does not decay. With these caveats, disposal in fire appears to be more comfortable, more ethical, more efficient, and takes less labor.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @05:53AM (2 children)
Comfortable?!?!? Who are you, Satan?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @05:56AM
Allah, the Great Deceiver
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @05:58AM
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @06:23AM (2 children)
I'll keep my body around for resurrection, thank you
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @06:55AM
As my Grandpa put it when my Catholic family freaked out about his decision to be cremated, "If God can figure out how to put your mother's cancer ridden body back together, not to mention bring our decomposed bodies back to life in the first place, I don't think a cremation will be much of an obstacle."
(Score: 2) by The Archon V2.0 on Friday January 04 2019, @07:25PM
Joke's on you, the dragon killed the cleric first.
(Score: 3, Informative) by c0lo on Friday January 04 2019, @06:39AM
Oh, but they are. Put them in an acidic peat-ty soil, the bacteria there will love some phosphate ions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @07:57AM (4 children)
https://www.quora.com/Which-part-of-the-human-body-remains-un-burned-after-cremation [quora.com]
Bones are not burned. They remain, so.....
They do that in cremation too. Some of the metals in implants are money maker ;) More seriously, it depends on local laws. In some countries, you have to return the implants after death. Heck, many implants are removed from body before cremation.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140311-body-parts-that-live-after-death [bbc.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @08:03AM (1 child)
The Nazis certainly thought so. Suprising the amount of gold that can be extracted from teeth for example.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @07:28PM
You can also recover it after burning. It's common to melt metals down as part of the process of separating gold from the other mineral content of ore. Gold will tend towards the bottom with the lighter and more common elements floating to the surface.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @01:09PM
bones are not bio degradable? tell me not. i have a funny video i cannot upload to youtube that is about my dog eating a bone and watching it turn him into a triangular shape until he poops it back out. the pooping the non bio degradable bone is the most funny part.
dont ask me why he doesnt just eat it again, over and over and over, sine he cannot really digest it.
also they found some gen in animals with bones that once ingested makes dead bones invisible to the eye thus all meat eaters cannot see the mountains of bio un degradable bones that surround us.
a long time veggetarin broke out in tears and sobed hysterically when i asked her about this and and when pressed to for an answer, said that you dont need a rocket to get to the moon but that a secret vegetarian society has build a invisible ladder made from bio undegradable BONES to it already ...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04 2019, @09:29PM
Burnt bones make good soil-additions though, similar to charcoal. The high porosity and low rate of decomposition makes them useful for improving bacterial populations in the soil.