From dust to dust!

[Videoskooter]

Britain's Channel 4 is completing the preparations for a new TV-program "From dust to dust": they will show the complete desintegration (hope I spell that right :oops: ) of a human body. They now are looking for a volunteer who will give the permission for filming this after he or she passed away. The program will be taped on a secret location and gets the support from the London Museum of Science.

My opinion? I don't know???? (I'm not gonna watch it though)

[Voyage]

How sick to film and watch that...some people should get a life.

I mean respect for the audience and the dead person and his family.

Voyage

[Videoskooter]

It's all done under the name of science, I suppose. The idea is not new. A belgian artist (yes, artist :o ) has asked permission to do that, only last year. He got an abolute NO GO by the ethics commission.

See, I can fully understand that scientists want to see that sort of process but I can't get the idea for showing it on television.

But ...and I stress that sensitive people stop reading here!

In the 50's, the Spitzner collection travelled in Belgium. It was a sort of parade on the funfairs where they were showing all kind of diseases (like soa's) and all the strange things that can happen with a human body. Now, some say the stuff was made of wax but others say that real bodyparts and babys were shown.

I never saw it coz' it stopped travelling before I was born but my parents say that it was awful, horrifying but that it attracted great crowds. The collection is now owned by the Anatomic Museum of Paris.

You can read a litlle here:
http://www.antiqbook.nl/boox/ame/703.shtml (don't worry, no photos)

So I guess Television is just the next phase when it comes to satisfying human curiosity.

[JussiK]

In ancient Arab cultures, a person approaching old age would often start consuming immense amounts of honey. Once deceased, the corpse of this person would then be placed in a box and submerged with the sweet stuff. Then after a decade or so, the box would be opened. What the family had in their hands now was a large, almost human size piece of honeyed candy-like substance, ready for consumption. Now THAT would be something to cover in a future episode of the reality tv show in question :-)

[Nano]

There was a Peter Greenaway movie called "Zoo" in where two brothers did photograph diverse organic objects to appreciate its progressive disintegration. First it was an apple, then some animal... At the end they killed themselves in front of the camera to leave testimony of their own de-composition (yes, it was an ART film).

Do you know how they plan to do this? Maybe put a camera inside a coffin? The tag would be "the ultimate reality show"? :o

[Videoskooter]

How I understand it: they're going to put the loved one in a secret studio and then let the cameras roll. No coffin, just on a table I think.