X-Message-Number: 32094
From: 
Date: Fri, 23 Oct 2009 16:08:13 EDT
Subject: Re: Remains in Sewers

There is too much worry about human remains going into sewers.
 
We are surrounded by pathogens and toxic materials. Every day we encounter  
people with AIDS and other diseases. But we do not drink gasoline or Draino 
or  antifreeze and so we are rarely poisoned. We do not engage in unsafe 
sex and we  are reasonably sanitary in our habits so we do not get much 
disease.
 
Sewage is dangerous and we should not drink it, but it would be far less  
dangerous than antifreeze (which is fatal.) It rarely contains toxic 

chemicals  -- mostly it's shower water, clothes washing water etc. But feces 
does 
pass  cholera and other dangerous pathogens, so sewage is dangerous. (Even so, 
recall  that we are descended directly from chimp-like animals that drank 
from water  holes containing hippos, hippo poo, dead-and rotting hippos etc., 
and survived.  They were soon immune to all the stuff in that crawling 
mess. So were humans and  so are humans. "It was crawlin' and it stunk, but of 
all the drinks I've drunk,  I'm greatfullest for one from Gunga Din.") And 
the famous London well that was  padlocked, stopping the cholera outbreak -- 
that had been contaminated by a  nearby privy and people had drunk from it 
without ill effect for years. It was  only when the cholera  epidemic  got 
cholera in that it sickened  people. Our immune systems are tough - they are 
made for water holes!)
 
So sewage is dangerous but not if we don't drink it or get it in an open  
cut. It goes to treatment plants where all the bad things are digested by  
bacteria and made innocuous just as in nature, or are otherwise removed.
 
Viruses and especially AIDS die very quickly outside the living human body, 
 so you are *very* unlikely to get AIDS from sewage or a corpse. Living 
humans  are far more dangerous.
 
As for mortuary waste -- yes, it's yucky, but no more dangerous than a  
rotting racoon in your yard or the spoiled hamburger you just put down the  
garbage disposal. I have many squirrels in my yard, and they only live two 
years  or so, so I must be around lots of rotting animal corpses and so must 
everyone  else. Human remains are no different. Yes, be careful with corpses 
and  don't plunge a hand with a cut into rotting remains (that killed many 
anatomists  during dissections because rotten meat is crawling with bacteria 
that live on  meat and infect the living too, though with antibiotics I think 
they'd be OK  today.) But aside from such common sense cautions, there is no 
need to have a  superstitious fear of human remains and chemicals from 

mortuaries and sewage.  The bacteria at the treatment plant will handle them the
same as any other  nutrients.
 
Alan Mole
Civil Engineer with a class on water treatment.
 
 
In a message dated 10/23/2009 3:00:58 A.M. Mountain Daylight Time,  
 writes:

CryoNet  - Fri 23 Oct 2009

#32092: Dangerous Rationalizations  [JOSEPH W MORGAN]
#32093: Sewers and such [Keith  Henson]

Rate This Digest:  http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=32092%2D32093

Administrivia

To  subscribe to CryoNet, send email to:

with the subject line (not message  _body_):
subscribe
To unsubscribe, use the subject  line:
unsubscribe



Message  #32092
From: "JOSEPH W MORGAN" <>
Subject:  Dangerous Rationalizations
Date: Thu, 22 Oct 2009 07:49:24  -0700

Melody Maxim's Dangerous Rationalizations post is right on  target.

Larry Johnson's book Frozen raises serious questions about the  credibility 
and competence of Alcor.  These issues need to be addressed,  not 
rationalized or ignored.  Big changes need to be made.

Joseph  W. Morgan



 Content-Type: text/html;

[ AUTOMATICALLY SKIPPING HTML ENCODING! ] 

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=32094