When you're dead, would you like to be buried or cremated?

any usable organs donated to those who can use them...the remaining carcass should be donated for medical study and if anything is left after that...dispose of it as medical waste...I won't care, I will be long gone.

not sure yet

Cremated, after they've taken out any organs or whatever else that might help someone else. Of course, if I live to be 100 as I hope, probably nobody would want what's left of my organs!

After I'm cremated, I expect mandy to carry my ashes around with her in a box under the driver's seat of her car. (woof!)

...and my tombstone I want it to read;

"His last words were: What the hell is that?"

A cemetery is a waste of good real estate.

What do all the survey creators that have asked this question have against mausoleums?

I don't know it is hard to say. I would like to be with my family, but then I want to be cremated.

It seems like a waste of good organic matter to burn it, and add to air pollution and stuff.

k. o' c. - I agree.

Growing up I lived across the street from mausoleum. I would watch the smoke coming out of that huge white chimney on cold winter nights and think all sorts of strange thoughts. It was a huge building with a fully circular drive in front where I would ride my bike around and around pretending it was a horse and I was racing in the Kentucky Derby. In the middle of the circular drive was a perfect lawn and some tremendous evergreen trees that you could duck under and climb up into to hide.
I found out recently that my mother and father once went under one of those trees one night when they were drunk and had sex. EW!

I like cemeteries, some are really nice. Peaceful place to go walk.
There are a lot of things that are wastes of good real estate.

I want to be left right where I died, to rot naturally. People I knew can come by to see my corpse. They can check back every few weeks to see how the decomposition is going. The smell should go away after a while. I think ventilation of the area is fine.

I never knew you were a performance artist, bill.

I like the idea of being cremated way more than of rotting in the ground. But I also like the idea of some sort of small headstone commemorating me. I have a friend who buried her parents' ashes, so there's a headstone as well--but I think if I'm cremated I want the ashes scattered somewhere.
Of course, being put in a big stone sarcophagus in a funky gothic crypt or tomb has its appeal, too.

bill - Jen may object to your wishes if you die peacefully in your sleep in bed!

I want to be left out on a bier for eagles to peck at, or mulched & composted.

I'm dead. Stick me in a meat grinder and toss me to the fishes for all I care. Get my atoms back into the eco-system in the most efficient manner possible, please.

jonathan - there are good reasons we don't compost meat. It's not healthy.

My soul and spirit will leave long before my body turns cold.
I cremated my son and have him with me until my passing so our ashes can be sprinkled together.

romkey - Now that you mention it, I remember hearing about it. Why is that?

Buried. I don't like fires now, I don't think I will then either.

Buried, that would allow more open space to remain on the Earth. That is the only reason, I don't really care about me in comparison to the Earth.

I would like to be cremated and then buried. This is a repeat, and the original had the same problem.

Give me some concrete shoes.

jonathan - I think it's because things that grow in meat tend to be bad for us - they grow in us, too (especially if the meat is human ). So we don't eat our own meat and we don't feed it to things we eat (animals or plants).

Definitely cremated.

romkey - Thanks for the explanation. Too bad that's not the case in chicken, pig, etc. farming. It's not uncommon for processed bits from the slaughterhouse (bones, feathers, entrails, etc.) to end up in animal feed.

It's also important not to eat our own brains (however tempted you may be).

Kuru, here we come!

I want to be buried in Ireland.

Where in Ireland, Eeah?
My option would be in Dublin: St James' Gate!

vos: did you actually go to St. James' Gate while you were in Dublin? Beer factories are not in my experience the best places for enjoying their products, and I didn't think that was any exception.

Each: What will happen when the dead greatly greatly outnumber the living? If every person who ever lived gets a plot of land I'm pretty sure that one day the planet will run out of space. Unless we cut down more rain forests.

phi: Yes, I went there for the second time (the first time was in 1986). I only went there to buy a cap and a rugby-shirt, and I got a 'free' Guinness as well. It tasted very well!

Perhaps part of my problem is that my favorite stout is brewed in Cork...

phi: Have you ever been there?

Bill and Jonathan: I was just watching Ripley's Believe it or Not and saw something that might interest you. It was a body farm in Tennessee. People can donate their bodies to the farm to be used for forensic experiments. They put the bodies in car trunks, bury them, and under tarps in the woods so they will begin to rot. Then they use the bodies as teaching and learning tools to identify the bones.

Here's how to get in touch:

Tennessee Anthropological Association
Department of Anthropology
University of Tennessee
Knoxville, Tennessee 37996-0720
(615) 974-4408

Also, I think a book called The Body Farm By Patricia Cornwell tells a little bit about it.

That rocks!

I thought so too.

The showed that on Dutch tv as well.
Just imagine the smell there!

vos: to St. James' Gate, yes. To Cork, no.

There was an article about the body farm in the Utne Reader too, you might be able to find it on the web.

eeah: don't apologize, there is no need

natsim: I tried.. couldn't find too much.. if anyone finds anything.. please tell me the link

**they: Reuters had this story on it.

daver: Thanks.. that was really cool... I think I changed my mind about where I want to rot.

When I die.....I'm going to the Farm!!! YeeHAW!!!!!!!!

I guess there are laws about burying people without expensive fancy boxes. I want them to get rid of my body as cheaply as possible. A pine box would work well for me because I want to make sure all the little bugs and critters get in and spread my nutritious self out into the soil. Cremation seems like it would reduce the fertilizing value of my body. Being buried in a stainless-steel-lined rosewood coffin with silver accents is RIGHT OUT!

Burying dead folks seems like an awful waste of valuable real estate.

I guess I would like to be buried.

I want to have a Viking buriel and want it to be in Iceland.

Cremation

I agree... cremate, and scatter the ashes someplace poetic. I don't need to take up land that the living could use.

Cremated totally. Or just disappear so no one will know what became of me. I would hate to be buried in the ground, although I think cemetaries are beautiful. I also wouldn't want a funeral. Yuck. But I don't need to worry about that anytime soon because I'm going to live to be 400.

Geez, I thought I was optimistic planning to live to be 100!