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If being chopped up and composted helps the environment, saves space and means there are less corpses around for the eventual zombie uprising then I'm all for it.

The police have a forensics unit which always needs bodies. Basically, in order to more accurately be able to assess time of death etc. in murder cases, they leave corpses out in varying environmental conditions and constantly keep notes on how they rot in order to have something to compare bodies found in suspicious circumstances to. A useful and potentially justice-serving end. Perhaps your could explore the ethics of that.

Why is burning a complete body socially acceptable but chopping up and burying the parts in an ethically sound way not? Perhaps saving the planet requires a rethinking of our taboos. And we should be thinking about a compromise - burial that is more environmentally compatable but doesn't offend this particular social norm. Surely that isn't beyond the boundaries of human ingenuity.

why not recycle your body and donate your organs?
Either to someone in need of a donor, or to medical research.

I am no expert on anthropological matters but it appears to me that many cultures who see a dead body a as merely an empty shell still treat it "with respect". I find that quite strange.

I've often thought about the "Body Farm" option as mentioned by Mills in a previous comment. I don't suppose it could work as a long-term solution as we would end up with massive body farms if we all did it, but hey it's making a point too isn't it - got to be worth checking out.

I would love it if my body could be thrown from a ship in the middle of the ocean (one that was already carrying out some other necessary journey of course!) and eaten by what ever happened to be passing! So what of burial at sea, is that a legal way of disposing of a corpse no longer? Was it ever?!

Here's hoping we get enlightened soon as burial and cremation are clearly no longer viable.

Burial at sea in British waters is permitted, in certain areas, under strict circumstances - no infections diseases, specifics of coffin manufacture etc. A permit is required from the Marine Consents & Environment Unit, part of DEFRA. Taking a body out of the UK for burial outside UK waters at least requires a permit for removal of the body, and my be subject to other regs I haven't found yet.
It's only "green" if there's no glue holding the container together, the traditional materials are a few yards of sailcloth and a few fathoms of chain, but the sailcloth shouldn't be synthetic, and the chain will eventually rust away, although it will take longer than the ethical (or any other) man!

"Soylent Green is made out of people". If someone is willing to suggest that butchering bodies is reasonable behaviour, why not turn them into food, as the sc-fi film Soylent Green shows?

This is Third Reich practicality.

Wasn't (Dame) Barbara Cartland buried in a cardboard coffin, with a nice tree put on top? There are a growing [sorry] number of places where you can be buried in a field, with a nice view and lots of trees, whose roots can suck up your goodness. That sounds pretty ethical!

You could donate your body to a medical school - we always need doctors. Then at least it is recycled.

I'm all for being green while alive so why not be green when I'm dead. Funeral homes and churches etc make a fine living out of 'proper funerals'. Either compost me or plant me under a tree, whichever costs the least.
I won't be there anyway.

"Like all Loonies, we conserve our dead--and am truly glad that barbaric custom of burial was left back on old Earth; our way is better. But Davis family does not put that which comes out of processor into our commercial farming tunnels. No. It goes into our little greenhouse tunnel, there to become roses and daffodils and peonies among soft-singing bees. Tradition says that Black Jack Davis is in there, or whatever atoms of him do remain after many, many, many years of blooming.
Is a happy place, a beautiful place."

R A Heinlein, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, 1966 Maybe its about time we caught up with him.

I've always liked to think my living has greater benefit than my death. In terms of Carbon emissions, I doubt this is true. I like to think all the other things I do outweigh the things that would and wouldn't happen if I wasn't here. If I take nothing physical with me after death, I'd like to take my discoveries. I'd like my corpse to be frozen with liquid nitrogen, as I don't like the thought of being burnt alive. I don't like the thought of being a corpse in limbo either. Being frozen into millions of pieces seems the best option to me, just like losing the feeling when building snowmen. I'd like to think this last decision can be my choice and no-one else's. A final breath from the vestige of my selfish gene. This will truly be the time when I will say to hell with it, it really is someone else's problem.

Shall we all grok our dead friends?

Don't the Parsi put thier folks out for the birds? I believe the Tibetans do some chopping up too. Perhaps these folks have some suggestions as to how we can be more flexible with rituals for the dead.

One of the issues is how we can remember our dead. I've always liked burial as I know there's a grave where I can remember them. I don't like cremation as often that isn't the case. I'd be interested in the tree idea - then the tree is the place.

In regards to post 8, my mother was buried in 2004 in a Woodland Burial Ground which we found in a book called "The Natural Death Handbook". She had joked about wanting to be buried in a cardboard box at the bottom of our garden, and was very pleased to discover that such things were actually possible!

Our Woodland Burial Ground, Hinton Park, offers a choice of traditional oak effect, cardboard or bamboo coffins, each with no handles. My understanding being that the cardboard coffins are designed to be eco-friendly and to fully decompose.

I believe some Woodland Burial Grounds allow you to supply your own coffin, and there are various suppliers of cardboard and other eco-friendly coffins listed in the handbook.

With Woodland Burial the graves are marked with name plaques and (native) trees, and you can also plant flowers. The idea being that the area will be allowed to develop into a woodland.

I can certainly vouch for the fact that it creates a beautiful setting, which I personally find much more appealing than rows and rows of headstones. The clumps of daffodils and hyacinths on a sunny spring day are really a sight to behold!

I can't see how putting a body in a food processor or whatever is any different to burning it, except you get more useful nutrients. But, would they get people who would do the work?

But, I suppose since I am human, I like the idea of visiting the departed, and perhaps even of being visited - I may not be there, but it is a recognition that I had been alive. I like the hydrogren idea, or even better, the Woodland Burial Grounds.

When I die I just want a memorial bench on Hampstead Heath - I don't give e monkeys what happens to my body. Given I like to lead a reasonable ethical life, can I offset the trees used to make the bench?

'Alas, I am food for worms!' - Mercutio ( From Romeo & Juliet)
'Alas, I am food for worms!...still, thats better than using up 285kwh of gas I suppose...) - ethical Mercutio

Hello,

Please refer to the 2003 book entitled Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers. A chapter in the book is devoted to composting as an alternative to burial and cremation.

By the way, I can attest to the viability of composting. I run a composting business in the U.S. I assist veterinarians and their clients, by composting people's pets. Part of my service is to plant a memorial plant or tree with the composted remains i.e. a dogwood with ones dog, catnip with ones cat. It works quite well.

I understand that when some people die they might want to be chopped up into little bits and composted, or their bodies donated to a body farm.

However, it isn't them that will have to carry out their last wishes - it's their family or loved ones.

My son may think it's cool to be minced and mulched after death, but I can't bear to think of my child lying dead on a slab whilst some butcher hacks him to pieces. The mental image is too traumatic, too distressing. I wouldn't be able to allow that to happen to him.

I also don't like the idea of his body being left on the ground at a body farm somewhere, being left to rot and poked and prodded every so often. There is no dignity there.

People need to think of the distress the surviving relatives might feel if the relatives are asked to dispose of the deceased's body in a manner which the relatives would find upsetting to them.

Do we have a right to traumatise our families in this way?

Yes Parsi or Zoroastrian idea of putting out for vultures - high on pillars out of the way - must be the most e-friendly way.

Bob Hope's wife asked him the question 'burial or cremation?'. He replied, 'I don't know; surprise me'.

The problem with more ecologically friendly coffins is that the undertaker would usually line the coffin with plastic sheeting, most do not rot down and further inhibit decomposition by containing the fluids that seep from the copse within a "plastic marinade"!.

Woodland burial is fine but with the close poximity of graves there is the issue that surely the trees would need to be thinned out as they mature. I only know of one forward thinking cemetery which places coffins within a glade clearing for this reason.

My mother died nearly ten years ago and was cremated as per her wishes.

Her ashes were scattered very close to the location that she had specified, in the sea, at a place that she loved more than any other on this earth.

By now they must all be scattered around the globe with the tides, but I never feel that I need a place to go to to remember her - I have the place right here with me all the time - in my heart.

Ethical Man certainly is getting down the business of disposing of his body.

Composting is certainly one way.

I think I'd rather plant a tree not a headstone.

It's a shame the ethical man will be composted as he'll be too late to attend The London Green Funeral Exhibition, 28 April, Holborn WC1 - to see lots of options.

Information from The Natural Death Centre, tel 0871 288 2098,

www.naturaldeath.org.uk

I have indicated in my will that I would like my body to be donated to medical research after my death; however, I know that the med schools finally cremate the body and return the ashes to the family (at least that is what happens in the US). So there is still the cremation issue... we do need a public discussion of this in the environmetal lobby. Well done for bringing it into the open.

Yes, there does need to be a public debate on the ecology of body diposal & choices.

Not just choices, but the meaning and impact of those choices.

In an increasingly consumer driven society then funerals could be treated as a product. But the purpose and ritual of the funeral should not be overlooked for choice in whicker coffins and whether to release doves !!!

It needs to have meaning.

At The London Green Funeral Exhibition mentioned above
-- are planning on having a panel discussion on green funerals -
it should be most lively.

Funeral Directors are not going to start that debate, it needs to come from us.

I think that's what the Natural Death Centre have been doing for the last 15 years by pioneering & leading the natural death movement.

Where do you stand on choice versus consumerism versus ecology versus ritual?
Or will you be dead and so won't give a hoot.

My Grandad always used to say he'd be happy being chucked on the compost heap while everyone whistled "I'm for ever blowing bubbles". He died over 30 years ago - clearly a man ahead of his time.

I feel as unconcerned as he did about what happens to me. I know my family will want a say as well - but I'm not sure any of the above are actually worse mental images than cremation..just we are used to that being "normal" so probably don't thing about it too much.

I also slightly wonder if we aren't getting this out of proportion though. There must be ways of dealing with bodies that are better and worse, but by definition each of us will die just once. Its the things we do every year, or every month or every day (like driving miles to work) that really add up to a major impact on the environment.

Hmm. Interesting topic. My mother was cremated and her ashes scattered. My mother-in-law says "mulch pile". My husband's grandmother died recently, and her coffin was encased in cement, as required by the (local Canadian) authorities, which horrified me somewhat. So much for decomposing, locked in all that stuff! I do like the idea of freeze-drying and adding my loved one (or myself) to the compost pile. Except if you move, of course, and leave the compost pile behind!

My Mum was a gardener and keen composter. We burried her on our own land in a grave that wasn't too deep (so she was close to the loam layer of soil). We bought a eco coffin off the internet who delivered the coffin to the funeral directors. Her funeral was beautiful and fitting close to her own beloved garden. We deffinately couldn't have coped with chopping her up! There is a mid way.

The ethics of composting corpses are equal to that of Zero Point Energy. Corpses rot, it's a fact. Cremation is a public health issue to prevent the spread of disease. Imposing a rotting corpse on the living is as ethically problematic as is providing reservoirs for mosquitoes to breed, spreading malaria. Does the landfill tax apply to rotting corpses ? If so, then maybe there should be a series of crematoria that act to power electricity to the national grid. This does however have the macabre similarities to the concentration camps operated by antisemitic socialist fascists of the past. Should the use of biological washing powder be a better more ethical option than cremation for corpse disposal ?

It is one thing to compost a body: quite another to compost the feelings and memories of husband or wife , family and friends.

I think all contributions above have made this subject delightfully authentic. It is so important for us to actually have these discussions. I personally believe that my family and friends will be glad to be able to say farewell to me in a ritual of my choice and hopefully have a good laugh when composting me or have a picnic to remember me underneath the tree that feeds on me. I suggest the 'Natural Death Handbook' for more info on death and dying and burial.

Might I suggest anaerobic digestion as an alternative to composting? Leading on from an earlier post on the lifecycle cost of the various options, this method appears to have been left out - but given that the human body is largely digestible, this could be a very energy efficient option. Of course, you'd need to mince up the deceased first to ensure that your feedstock was appropriately prepared, but after this you'd have a nice benign process which generates biogas (which can be burned to generate electricity) and a compostable residue which could be used as a growing medium.

It might even be carbon-neutral. I'm all for being minced and turned into biogas and horticultural growing medium myself :-)