Kevin's Watch

This is ridiculous. I should be able to throw my head back in laughter at the pure thought of it, but there's this little element of doubt. Didn't I hear that in Ireland or Turkey a couple of years ago, the official cause of death recorded on a man's certificate was that of Spontaneous Human Combustion? Is there any....any.... doubt that SHC is just bullshit; that occasionally people burn to death by means that cannot be ascertained - but that the one thing we can be absolutely 100% sure of is that they did not, repeat did not, spontaneously combust. A quick check on Wikipedia did not seem to result in this [what I would have thought was obvious] ascertainment - rather the situation seemed to be against, but still with a dash of possibility thrown in.

I had intended as a possible charity money raising venture, considered auctioning my patented 'Anti-spontaneous Human Combustion' underpants [complete with 100% Guarentee that no-one that had bought a pair had ever died of spontaneous human combustion] - but I wouldn't want to get into potentially dangerous waters by making false claims about the efficacy of said pants which could later come back to haunt me. Why is nothing in life ever simple? I suppose I'll have to revert to my 'fall back product' The Emporer's New Clothes.

If you *did* market "anti-spontaneous human combustion pants" with that claim, you couldn't be accused of false advertising. Not until somebody actually spontaneously combusted while wearing them, anyhow...

AFAIK it is a real thing. However, it's more of a class of unresolved causes of death than it is an actual phenomenon. People are discovered incinerated, and no cause can be found. Like any mystery, you can choose to be as open-minded as you wish about what may have caused it.

Attanasio, in In Other Worlds, suggests it is caused by aliens who are transforming people into pure light as part of some sort of digestion process.

Call me sceptical but doesn't the ubiquitous presence of a fireplace, a pair of legs and a pile of ashes in all the photographic evidence raise some doubts......

Call me skeptical back but do you think anyone would consider spontaneous combustion when a more mundane answer is on hand?

Have you looked at any of the actual, seriously considered cases? [link]

No Wayfriend - I fully admit my 'research' on the topic was limited to a thirty second scan of Mikipedia, sorry Wikipedia [that was a genuine typo btw - freudian or what?]. I stand suitably chastised .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0aBVDRJLZM

I found the most unbiased, sane and stable source online, like ever.

I've always assumed that SHC is related to diabetic ketosis and the catalytic effects of severe alcoholism. Add in smoking and you've got a walking talking time bomb.

Doc Hexnihilo wrote:I've always assumed that SHC is related to diabetic ketosis and the catalytic effects of severe alcoholism. Add in smoking and you've got a walking talking time bomb.

no. I believe Alex Jones blamed the government.

It's not often that I get my back up from Alex Jones [therein may be my mistake ] but on this occasion it happens that he is referring to the very report that I was mentioning in my original post. I read this in the UK press at the time [hence my hazy memory of the location earlier], and just to emphasise what I thought was the significance of the thing - 'SHC' was the actual cause of death as recorded by the official coroner investigating the case. This was in Ireland - two years ago. SHC given official recognition on a state document as a recordable cause of death.

It was a long time ago that I studied physiology, and I've had some firsthand experience of some of the odd things that bodies can do over the years, but I guess I must have missed the lectures on this one - but if SHC it is, SHC it is!

Hey, Dickens thinks it's real. Just read Bleak House.

Most victims are diabetic alcoholics who have been drinking heavily.

www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Professors-bre ... story.html

sgt.null wrote: no. I believe Alex Jones blamed the government.

*laugh* Alex Jones. He may be a fellow Texan but that man is a real kook and a nut-job. He is part of the reason Austin stays Weird.

Hashi Lebwohl wrote:

sgt.null wrote: no. I believe Alex Jones blamed the government.

*laugh* Alex Jones. He may be a fellow Texan but that man is a real kook and a nut-job. He is part of the reason Austin stays Weird.

I just feel uneasy that many take him as gospel...

SerScot wrote:Hey, Dickens thinks it's real. Just read Bleak House.

Was Dickens also not the man who [ ....grisley subject warning, read no further if you are of a sensitive disposition.... ] attended an guillotining [is 'an' the correct indefinite article to use prior to the word guillotining] in order to either confirm or deny that subsequent to decapitation, the neck is found to be neither attached to the head nor to the body, but has mysteriously vanished as if it never were. Strangely, on the odd occasions where I have inadvertantly stumbled across photographs of decapitated human bodies [not something I do by choice I assure you] the bizzare thesis seems to have been confirmed as the neck never seems to be anywhere to be seen.