Yes, we have. But we also typically just tossed the corpse into a pine box and buried it.

Now we bury a hell of a lot more than just the corpse.

Coffins in particular are just straight up weird to me. Polished and plush, why? They even come with rubber gaskets to “protect” your now ex-loved one, which is quite creepy when you think it through.

Yeah, it's true. And I personally hate the thought of my bones sitting in a box in the ground.

I really like the thought of the "sky burial"[1]. Basically, they bring your remains to the top of a mountain and wait for vultures to clean off the bones. Then the bones are crushed into a powder and mixed with something called tsampa for the crows and other birds to eat afterwards. It seems like a safe way to dispose of remains, is spiritually significant (to me), and is actually useful to the ecosystem. Unfortunately, it's very costly on time.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_burial

Disposing of human remains in a regular cemetery is safe as well, unless maybe you drill a well right next to it.

You know what excretes far more E. Coli than a dead body? A living body. That bacterium is basically everywhere where there are animals, infections are pretty common.

Plus, if you have any of those artificial things that the article mentions, that will still have to be disposed of otherwise, lest the bird eat it.

> Then the bones are crushed into a powder and mixed with something called tsampa for the crows and other birds to eat afterwards.

Sounds like yet another great way to catch an E. Coli infection: Grinding down bone contaminated with bird poop.

The fully opinioned coffin now comes with heated seats and mirrors, adaptive cruise control, and a hybrid turbo diesel-electric engine that only sort-of-cheats on emissions.

I joke, but: funerals are as expensive as a secondhand car.

Whereas I figure I’ll die at home and my dogs will eat me before anybody realises. Much cheaper.

I only sort of joke here: all the bits of cows, sheep, and pigs, we don’t want to eat we turn in to other products. Why can’t we do the same for human bodies? I mean, so long as the person didn’t die of infectious disease their remains could probably be recycled in to the biosphere?

> I mean, so long as the person didn’t die of infectious disease their remains could probably be recycled in to the biosphere?

Human bodies are full of parasites and pathogens that are dangerous to humans: just because someone got hit by a car doesn't make their body sterile. That's one reason the BSE (mad cow disease) spread, feeding cows to other cows. It's also a reason we don't generally fertilize crops with human waste, although horse or cow manure works very well.

So we probably can recycle human bodies, but there are extra genuine health concerns. One pretty safe way is to bury them in the ground and let them get eaten by worms - but as the article points out, even that comes with health risks.

If I recall correctly the BSE outbreak was due to using brains in feed.

I agree with your general point about extra genuine health concerns.

> feeding [components of] cows to other cows.

How did the Japanese do it with night soil then? Did they burn it before using it as fertilizer?

I don't know about the Japanese, but in Europe where this practice was common (certainly in London) one answer is simply that they tolerated more outbreaks of infectious disease.

It's possible to make it safe through composting, but that requires more time and skill than a typical compost heap. Most composting authorities recommend keeping cat and dog faeces - less dangerous than human waste, but much worse than cow manure - out of the garden compost heap.

Having a more or less vegetarian diet helps it some at least - less trophic layers since the diet is more akin to other herbivores although not as fibrous as grazers. Since fish was far less spread before advances in refrigeration and transportation those inland more would have been more subsidence farmer involuntarily vegan - let alone the increased acceptance of meat.

Trophic layers are a decent reason why. Apex predators of all sorts tend to collect pollutants for little energy gain. If you let say crows feed upon human flesh that is perfectly fine since they can't really prey upon humans but if you let say big cats, bears, wolves or wild dogs feed upon them they start to view humans a food source and can get it - although not without heavy consequences. Maneaters usually have teeth so bad that they essentially go for humans as their equivalent of "soft foods" despite the danger we are as frankly comparably abominations even by standards of apex predators.

Not to mention other incentive reasons - turning human remains into profit makes for bad incentives for the living. Instead of just leaving them to rot completely they end up being a public health risk, upsetting families with grave robbery, and possible murder for the sake of profit. There is a reason why the medical profession switched to plastic and it isn't because plastic of a perfectly anatomical match is less expensive.

yeah what's the deal with these massive plush caskets. it's being lowered gentry into the ground, not dropped from an airplane.

I assume that "gentry" was a typo there, but in fact the massive plush caskets are precisely because of the gentry being lowered into the ground. Once nice caskets became a status symbol, it was considered crass to put your dead relatives in an ecologically-responsible plain wooden box.

> it was considered crass to put your dead relatives in an ecologically-responsible plain wooden box.

The Jewish religion requires plain boxes, to show that by death everyone is equal, rich and poor.

It's actually preferable to have no box at all (because it slows decomposition), but US laws prevent that. So a plain wooden box with nothing that doesn't decompose is used.

It’s usually cemeteries that require vaults and caskets not the government.

A cynic in me thinks that if you wake up in the middle of being lowered into the ground, you won't be heard and rescued.

Also, the occupant is dead.