Thinkers’ Park

Death is a beautiful ending of a man’s life, for it is what gives life a meaning. Today we shall see some not so known facts related to death. Just read on.

1. Thanatology is the academic, and often scientific, study of death among human beings. It investigates the circumstances surrounding a person’s death, the grief experienced by the deceased’s loved ones, and larger social attitudes towards death such as ritual and memorialization. It is primarily an interdisciplinary study, frequently undertaken by professionals in nursing, psychology, sociology, psychiatry, and social work. It also describes bodily changes that accompany death and the after-death period.
2. There are more than 200 understatements regarding death. These include the statements “to be in Abraham’s bosom,“ “sleep with the Tribbles,“ as well as “just add maggots.“
3. The cause of death in all scenarios is one’s failure to breath or the lack of oxygen. This is caused by muscle spasms, which others consider as the agonal phase. Agonal was derived from the Greek word agon, which means contest.
4. The digestive enzymes in your body will begin to eat your organs within the first three days after death. Afterwards, the bacteria in your gut will feed on ruptured cells. This process will release sufficient noxious gas that will cause the body to bloat and the eyes to bulge.
5. Promessa, a Swedish company, claimed that it can decompose the body within six to twelve months after death. This is supported by the ecological burial method that the firm promotes. The method uses liquid nitrogen to freeze-dry the body and pulverize with high-frequency vibrations. Afterwards, the company will seal the body in a cornstarch coffin.
6. A certain group in India known as the Zoroastrian leave the bodies of dead people in the open and let the vultures eat the bodies.
7. Queen Victoria wanted to be buried wearing the bathrobe of her deceased husband Prince Albert while holding a plaster cast.
8. Families living in Madagascar dig up the bones of deceased loved ones and parade these within the village. This ritual or ceremony is known as the Famadihana. After the ceremony, the bones will be sealed in a new shroud and will be reburied. The used shroud will be received by the newly married and childless couple in the family and it will be used to cover the bed of the couple.
9. There are times under the right humidity and temperature, the fatty tissues of a buried corpse will become a substance that has the same appearance with a soap. This substance is known as the grave wax or the adipocerous. The formation of the substance depends on the presence of a damp and cold environment as well as the lack of oxygen. When this happens, the saponification will continue for hundreds of years.
10. During the 9th-century Europe, there were numerous anecdotal evidences, which proved that some illed individuals were mistakenly announced dead by health officials. Their bodies were laid out in health facilities specifically constructed for corpses.
11. There are many anecdotal references to people being declared dead by physicians and then ‘coming back to life’, sometimes days later in their own coffin, or when embalming procedures are just about to begin. Owing to significant scientific advancements in the Victorian era, some people in Britain became obsessively worried about living after being declared dead.
12. Do you know that the statistics of people who commit suicide in the City of New York are higher than those that are murdered.
13. Turritopsis nutricula is a small (5mm) species of jellyfish which uses transdifferentiation to become younger after sexual reproduction. This cycle can repeat indefinitely, rendering it biologically immortal. It originates from the Caribbean sea, but has now spread around the world.
14. Death messengers, in former times, were those who were dispatched to spread the news that an inhabitant of their city or village had died. They were to wear unadorned black and go door to door with the message, “You are asked to attend the funeral of the departed __________ at (time, date, and place).” This was all they were allowed to say, and were to move on to the next house immediately after uttering the announcement. This tradition persisted in some areas to as late as the mid 19th Century.
15. A death rattle is a gurgling or rattle-like noise produced shortly before or after death by the accumulation of excessive respiratory secretions in the throat. Those who are dying may lose their ability to swallow, resulting in such an accumulation. While death rattle is a strong indication that someone is near death, it can also be produced by other problems that cause interference with the swallowing reflex, for instance, brain injuries.
16. Sometimes, after an organism has died, small movements of the limbs (a twitch of a finger or even a whole leg moving) can be observed. This phenomenon, known as postmortem spasm, can be observed in human cadavers as well as smaller organisms that have died.

Source: Various

Mohan Rao.

To know, is to know that you know nothing. That is the meaning of true knowledge. – Confucius