The Sustainable Mushroom Death-Suit

[BridgeTheGap]

For most, death is followed by one of two options: burial or cremation. But both of those options pose serious environmental risks to the living. Burial is preceded by embalming, and the main chemical used to embalm a body is the known-carcinogen formaldehyde. Cremation is energy intensive and releases massive amounts of greenhouse gases and heavy metals into the atmosphere. Visual artist and human-environment researcher Jae Rhim Lee imagines a third way to rest in peace that is more in harmony with our planet: donning a fungi-laced death shroud that consumes corpses.

Lee calls her outré idea The Infinity Burial Project. (Or, “A Modest Proposal for the Postmortem Body.”) Here’s how it works. Lee has been cultivating shiitake and oyster mushrooms on her own fingernail clippings and strands of hair, hoping to find a strain of fungi that is quick to grow on decaying human tissue. When she finds a suitable strain, she plans to embroider a “Mushroom Death Suit” with spore-infused threads. The spores may be added to a “decompiculture kit” that can be used in funeral make-up and non-toxic embalming fluids—speeding the process along. Next, when Lee (or whoever) is buried, the fungi get to work—Lee also chose mushrooms for their innate ability to break down industrial toxins in bodies and the surrounding soil. Not only does the Infinity Mushroom prevent further damage to the environment from burial practices, it also helps clean up existing pollution.

Read more: http://www.utne.com/Science-Technology/Sustainable-Mushroom-Death-Suit-Jae-Rhim-Lee.aspx#ixzz1U572RqrL

[dtexdem]

1. Soylent gray, it's made from mushrooms grown on ...

LOL

[dixiegrrrrl]

2. Sounds good. I would choose that way to be buried.

I was going to say "in a heartbeat", but....never mind.

[hunter]

3. I'd rather be fed to the condors...

... but living at the top of a pesticide and pollutant contaminated food chain and full of prescription meds, I'm probably too toxic.

[OnlinePoker]

4. A local cemetary offers green burial

No embalming and body is clothed in biodegradable fabrics, and, if chosen, a biodegradable casket. Grave will have a concrete liner, but open at the bottom for contact with the bare earth.

[wtmusic]

7. Why would you even need a liner? nt

[OnlinePoker]

8. The cemetary website says it's regulation.

Could be a provincial rule, but I'm not sure. To keep the burial even greener, they say they keep the dirt from the grave right beside it during internment instead of trucking it away and bringing it back after, and the sod is reused vice replanting new grass.

[wtmusic]

9. Seems sort of weird.

The concrete wouldn't really be serving any function (not that it ever did anyway).

Actually a coffin doesn't either, except by protecting squeamish relatives from the idea of tossing shovelfuls of dirt on their beloved's upturned face.

I hope to last long enough where it's not an issue.

[phantom power]

5. If you want to be buried and decompose, it's pretty easy -- just don't be embalmed.

Forgoing the coffin -- also big help.

[wtmusic]

6. Cremation creates about as much CO2 as a tankful of gas

A growing movement toward "natural burial":

"Natural burial grounds are becoming common overseas, with over 260 created in the UK in the past 20 years. Whilst there is no single definition of what constitutes a natural burial, the objectives are widely agreed: that a body will oxygenate and so decompose, returning nutrients to the earth, with no toxic residues leaching into the soil or waterways.

This precludes toxic embalming fluids, and the casket or shroud, liners, and handles must be wholly natural materials. A tree, a simple stake, or no marker (and simply a GPS reference) is used to locate the grave, and burial sites should require little or no maintenance. Woodland and meadow burials are becoming especially popular in the UK, often with no markers. A range of 'standards' apply across UK natural burial sites. The 'purest' end of the spectrum would also require no jewellery, synthetic clothing, imported materials, mercury fillings, or synthetic replacement body-parts. Clearly this is likely to be a step too extreme for most, and preclude some of those wishing to use a natural ground. In most grounds, standards are set focussing on what is a reasonable minimisation of chemicals entering the ground with the focus on the type of casket and no embalming fluids to be used."

http://www.tenderrest.co.nz/greenerfarewell.html