Mary Burger King Chapter 1 Analysis

Mary Roach dives into the world of science cadavers to see and understand what happens to peoples’ bodies once they’ve donate their bodies after they die. In chapter one, attends a facial anatomy and face-lift refresher course sponsored by San Francisco university medical center. She follow one of the surgeons around asking questions about face lifts and different parts of the human face. In the chapter two, Roach tells about how people first began learning about human anatomy, the act of body snatching in the 19th century, and the lack of cadavers in the classroom. In Chapter three tells about how the human body decays and what factors contribute or hinder body decay. Researchers at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee experiment
They analyzed blood stains on the cloth which was told to Jesus’s blood after he tried to reposition himself to avoid being suffocated when he was crucified. In chapter eight , tells of her experience of watching a beating heart, brain dead cadaver arrive to UCSF medical center to be harvested for its functioning organs to save people that desperately need transplants. Chapter nine talks about decapitation and head transplants. Since the brain is the center of consciousness it might be possible to communicate with w recently severed head for a few seconds after it has been severed. In Chapter ten, Roach tells about a process in where an aged man in 12th century Arabia might sacrifice himself to become a medical confection known as a mollified man. The man would only eat honey for a month and when died he would be placed in a coffin filled with hone. Then after a hundred ears the coffin would be opened and its contents are used as an application to treat broken limbs and wounded limbs. In chapter eleven Roach visits the Colorado University Veterinary Teaching Hospital where she is curious to see how death is dealt with when bereaved relatives are removed as a factor. She then goes on to speak to a Michigan funeral home owner who talks about a process that can decrease a dead persons weight to 3% of its original body