Everyday Dying

It is fairly common to hear of cases of people who were able to predict that their death was coming shortly before they passed away. It included a personal experience with my grandfather who seemed to have known it a month in advance. While it is a phenomenon which is difficult to explain, with many people being sceptical claiming that such predictions tend to be a coincidence, some animals were found to be able to predict deaths with noteworthy accuracy. A relatively recent story is that of a cat called Oscar, who lives at a nursing home in Rhode Island and enjoys walking around the patients' rooms without interacting much with them. However, it was noticed that the cat is very friendly towards patients who are about to die and his prolonged presence by their bedside would often be an indicator of the patient being about to pass away within several hours. To date, Oscar had accurately predicted approximately 100 deaths. In 2007, there was a rumour that the cat had been killed...

It is common for individuals and relatives of the deceased to donate dead bodies to science, believing they are contributing to good causes, such as disease research and potential organ donations. Most often there are no questions asked once the donations have been made. However, what should be known, and most often is not publicised, is the fact that donating a body to science is likely to contribute to commercial activities of the company the corpse had been donated to, more than to the interests of actual true science. The reality is that the body-donation industry has loose regulations, and profits often matter more than ensuring the cadavers are actually used for legitimate research. A case has been recently reported of an amateur who purchased human heads from body-donation companies, for several thousand dollars each. He stored the heads in a refrigerator for the purpose of conducting self-taught experiments on them, even though the organisations claimed to only be selling par...

Qalqilya is a Palestinian city, which houses a 2-hectare zoo, open since 1986. It used to be a popular attraction among Arabic and Israeli visitors. However, once the Second Intifada (Palestinian uprising against Israel) began, visitors from outside of Qalqilya were no longer permitted to visit the zoo.  The zoo was often surrounded by violence as protests broke out. For example, at one time school children decided to throw stones at passing Israeli tanks. In response, the soldiers started shooting at them. This resulted in very some tragic losses.  One of the zoo's key projects were its giraffes. At the time the zoo housed two giraffes, male and female, with the female being pregnant at the time. When the sound of gunfire could be heard in the giraffes' enclosure, the male giraffe became very frightened, he panicked, and ran into a wall of his enclosure. This caused him to fall down, and as he was unable to get up, he died due to failed blood circulation (giraffes must not ...

"The world is not to be put in order; the world is order, incarnate. It is for us to harmonize with this order" - Henry Miller ---------------------------------------- Last weekend I visited my family in Manchester, UK. While I was there I took the opportunity to visit the Manchester museum, where natural history is a big theme and there is a large collection of taxidermy exhibits. My personal favourites were the birds and forest wildlife. Below are some pictures I took of the exhibits: 1. Taxidermy squirrel This exhibit shows part of the process involved in creating a mammal taxidermy. It is clear that the skin removed from the cadaver is placed on a man-made structure shaped as a squirrel. Of course, due to natural decay the animal's real eyeballs are replaced with glass eyes. I had a chance to touch a finished taxidermy squirrel in the museum and it felt like a living, furry animal, except for the lack of a spine. 2. The big bad wolf This angry-looking ...

Severed human heads can be shrunken and preserved. The process used to be carried out by tribal people from the Amazon rainforest for ritual, trade and trophy purposes. In some cases the shrunken heads could be used as toys for children. The demand for tsantsas (another name for the shrunken heads) from traders caused an increase in warfare between some of the Amazon tribes. Most of the demand came from dealers, museums and private collectors. The practice has ended around the 1960s. Tsatsa made by the Shuar tribe, currently exhibited in the Pitt Rivers museum in Oxford The procedure of shrinking a human head would first involve removing the skull by making an incision at the back of the head and pulling the skin off, while severing the muscles and tissues connecting the skin to the skull. The skull is thrown away, eyes are removed and cartlidges from the nose and ears are cut off. The skin is cleaned while being turned inside out. A purpose-made boiling pot is then filled with w...

I would like to dedicate this post to the man who made me realise that love no longer exists. A brief message to him is as follows: If you ever happen to come across this post, you know I'm talking about you, but the purpose is not to blame you or judge you for seducing countless women with your lies. I wish you could realise that the more you do it, the more likely you are to destroy your own life. The point is that all actions have their consequences. ----------------------------- As the title says, in this post I would like to talk about the potential deadliness of promiscuity (i.e. unsafe or excessive sexual behaviour, in case someone isn't sure). There exists undeniable proof that having multiple partners dramatically increases the risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases and cancer. And it is not only intercourse which can cause STDs, but also oral sex and even just touching each other can transmit harmful bacteria and viruses. But that's not the who...

Asphyxia is the key cause of death from things such as strangulation, drowning and carbon monoxide poisoning. It involves low level of oxygen in the body, combined with high carbon dioxide and acidosis (i.e. build up of lactic acid). In forensics there are 3 key categories of death via asphyxiation: Strangulation, Chemical Asphyxia, and Suffocation. Strangulation is the method most commonly used during murders. It was also used as a method of execution in the past. For example, the garrote was a device used for capital punishment in Spain, until as late as 1940. It involved tying a rope around the neck of the condemned, and twisting it until it was tight enough to cause strangulation. However, self-strangulation, often auto-erotic, is also very common. The auto-erotic type often involves taking in alcohol or other substances, such as drugs, while being strapped and positioned with the head lowered relative to the rest of the body. Several famous people died that way, including the Am...