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TV Show Seeks Terminally Ill Volunteer for Mummification

Terminal illness got you down? Does your future seems bleak? Channel 4 and production company Fulcrum TV would like to brighten your day by making you the star of an upcoming documentary. They would like to offer you the chance to be mummified on TV and maybe even displayed in a museum afterward. An advertisement for the project reads: "We are currently keen to talk to some one who, faced with the knowledge of their own terminal illness and all that it entails, would nonetheless consider undergoing the process of an ancient Egyptian embalming."

55 of 262 comments (clear)

  1. Depends... by Cryacin · · Score: 5, Funny

    Am I going to be done terriyaki style?

    --
    Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
    1. Re:Depends... by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 3, Informative

      I don't believe it - someone with mod points has never watched Futurama.

      I thought that was a requirement before anyone could get a Slashdot ID?

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    2. Re:Depends... by Anubis350 · · Score: 3, Funny

      It's not that, the mod's pissed 'cause *he* was going to eat that mummy!

      --
      "goodbye and hello, as always" ~Prince Corwin, from Zelazny's Amber series
    3. Re:Depends... by stuntpope · · Score: 2

      And some of us watched Futurama a few times and didn't care much for it. Give me a Monty Python, Dr Who, Simpsons reference any time. Futurama? meh.

      Please don't remind me of Katz.

  2. Creepy by Psychotic_Wrath · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Let me be the first to say thats kind of creepy. Are they gonna suck their organs out of them just like the egyptians used to? Cuz thats kind of weird.

    --

    Doctors do Massage in Longview WA now, who knew?
    1. Re:Creepy by DarkOx · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Because having you blood drained and replaced with embalming fluid and you body covered in makeup and posed like we do today commonly is perfectly rational.

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
    2. Re:Creepy by IndustrialComplex · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Because having you blood drained and replaced with embalming fluid and you body covered in makeup and posed like we do today commonly is perfectly rational.

      It is rational. It gives people time to travel (sometimes long distances) to consol one another on the passing of a friend. The makeup, the embalming fluid, it's all there for the purposes of the viewing. The funeral is for the living.

      Irrational is leaving a body to decompose and make the gathering uncomfortable for the sake of being the 'thoroughly modern nihilist' who doesn't follow those lame and old-fashioned traditions because they are soooo much cooler than that.

      --
      Out of modpoints but really liked a post? 1BDkF6TtmmeZ3yqXbz9yhdYVqRYnwFoXDj
  3. Don't forget to... by incognito84 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Remember, the actual brain is located in the stomach. That thing in your head is just waste and is to be disgarded!

  4. Sequel? by tsvk · · Score: 5, Funny

    Terminally III?

    Is that, like, the sequel to Terminally II?

    1. Re:Sequel? by wiredlogic · · Score: 4, Funny

      I prefer Terminally Ill: Revenge of Helvetica

      --
      I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
    2. Re:Sequel? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      I prefer Terminally Ill: Revenge of Helvetica

      A lot of people get that one muddled up with Terminally IV: Arial Strikes Back, because they're quite similar apart from some minor details.

      Personally, I found them both grotesque.

  5. Is there anyone not terminal? by BetterSense · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I am "faced with the knowledge of my own terminal illness" in that I am alive. I know that I will die, sooner or later. I understand that people who are terminally ill have a better idea as to the possible maximum, but we all have a possible maximum, and as you get older it will be looming for you, too. It annoys me when people are like "He KNOWS he's going to die, that must be so depressing". We all "know we are going to die". Nobody lives. Everyone dies. You should live accordingly.

    We can never satisfactorily "cure" cancer or any other disease. "Curing" a disease is defined as letting you live long enough to die from a different one. Numbers show that millions of lives have been saved by antibiotics, but have they? Just give them a bit more time. They will die sure enough. The only reason the "terminal illness" part is relevant to this TV show is they need the person to die on their TV schedule.

    1. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by wizardforce · · Score: 5, Insightful

      That is like saying that solar power isn't a renewable resource because eventually the Sun will die in 5+ billion years. It may be technically true but not meaningfully so.

      --
      Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
    2. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by DigiShaman · · Score: 2, Interesting

      We can never satisfactorily "cure" cancer or any other disease. "Curing" a disease is defined as letting you live long enough to die from a different one.

      True. But, there is a difference between dieing at the age of 25 vs 90. If possible, I would like to live as long as I potentially can. Life is too short as it is.

      --
      Life is not for the lazy.
    3. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by Tomfrh · · Score: 5, Insightful

      We all "know we are going to die"

      Well yeah, obviously, but that's completely different to being told "two months".

    4. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by Cryacin · · Score: 4, Funny

      You prevent deaths with condoms, birth control pills, and poor oral hygiene - by preventing the lives from starting.

      Don't forget to add personality to that list of prophylactics!

      --
      Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
    5. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by symbolset · · Score: 3, Insightful

      And slashdot, of course.

      --
      Help stamp out iliturcy.
    6. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by Hebbinator · · Score: 4, Funny

      Reminds me of the quotation:

      "Life is a sexually transmitted disease with 100% mortality rate."

    7. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by Tim+C · · Score: 2, Informative

      We can never satisfactorily "cure" cancer or any other disease. "Curing" a disease is defined as letting you live long enough to die from a different one.

      I know several people who are extremely happy to have been given the chance to die of something other than cancer.

      Numbers show that millions of lives have been saved by antibiotics, but have they?

      Yes, they have. If without them you would have been dead in days or weeks, but with them you successfully fight off the disease and are no longer in any danger of dying from it, then yes, they did save you. Even if you were hit by a bus and killed on the way home from getting the all-clear, that disease or infection did not kill you, and the antibiotics did save your life.

      I agree with the mantra that you should live your life according to the knowledge that it won't last forever, but the rest is needlessly fatalistic imho.

    8. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by Hognoxious · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It may be technically true but not meaningfully so.

      No it isn't.

      It's technically true that everyone will die sometime, but it isn't really meaningful in the context of making a film about it in the near future, which I presume the story is about (no, of course I didn't read it).

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    9. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by Tom · · Score: 4, Insightful

      We all "know we are going to die".

      Not really, no. I'm serious. One thing that humans are fascinatingly good at is ignoring this "knowledge". There's some brain research that shows evidence of our brains actually being wired up so that we avoid facing this, on very low-levels. In other words: It's not a conscious decision, not even an unconscious one. Runs a lot deeper than that.

      So, it's only true for broad definitions of "know". Yes, the fact is recallable from memory. But your brain goes to great lengths to ignore it, and almost always when you actually do recall it, it has about the same emotional impact as last year's sports numbers. Actually, for sports fans, less than that. But it shouldn't. Ever wondered why that is? Now you know. For some definitions of "know". :-)

      --
      Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
    10. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by stjobe · · Score: 4, Informative

      "Life is a disease; sexually transmitted and invariably fatal"
        - Neil Gaiman, Death: The High Cost of Living

      --
      "Total destruction the only solution" - Bob Marley
    11. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by jayme0227 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I think there's a big difference between "knowing" that you're going to die and "understanding" that you're going to die. Every one of us knows that our time is ticking down and that we will, some day, die. Most of us have had no reason to really grapple with our own mortality, and as such, don't really "believe" that we're going to die.

      I think this is part of the reason that funerals are so hard on so many people. They come that much closer to the understanding how fragile life is and to the fact that their life can be taken at any time.

      Sorry for the misuse of quotes above. I wanted it to be known that the concepts that I was leaning on weren't exactly the definition of those words, but my limited vocabulary couldn't allow me to find anything better.

      --
      But then I realized the cable was blue, so I only gave it one star. I hate blue.
    12. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by 2obvious4u · · Score: 2, Insightful

      There is a very obvious reason for why this is. If we actually really understood what being dead meant and really thought about it on the deep levels we would be in such a panic that we couldn't function as a society.

      The more I think about my own mortality the more I view Religion as a coping mechanism.

    13. Re:Is there anyone not terminal? by Hognoxious · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I doubt TV production companies (sorry to bring up the actual frikkin subject under discussion yet again) plan their filming schedule using eons as a unit.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  6. Dear Potential Corpse by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Hello,

    Commiserations on the news of your imminent demise. At Channel 4, we believe that the most appropriate way of dealing with this sad news, and the undoubted grief of your nearest and dearest, is for you to submit your corpse to be messed about with on national television for public "infotainment". The documentary we are producing will take just as sensitive, informative, and considerate an approach as the famous documentaries "The Boy Whose Skin Falls Off", "The Woman Who Never Grew Up" and our other televised equivalents of old-time circus freak-shows.

    We've set up a 24 hour hotline, just in case you really are that close to popping your cloggs, and look forward to working with your mortal remains soon!

    best regards,
    Channel 4 Public Relations.

  7. I don't see what the big deal is by daemonenwind · · Score: 2, Funny

    Being mummified on live TV isn't all that different from what kids are doing with Facebook these days, anyway.

  8. Re:why terminal? by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Informative

    Duh. Preferably you die the moment after you signed the contract so they can start making the documentary. Do you think they want to wait another 40ish years or however long you plan to live?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  9. Terminator III for Mumification? by Fotograf · · Score: 3, Funny

    how is that possible, i thought he was an robot from the future...

    --
    God's gift to chicks
    1. Re:Terminator III for Mumification? by The+Wild+Norseman · · Score: 5, Funny

      I died inside a little. Urrghh.

      WAIT! Hold on! Lemme get my camera first!

      --
      "A government is a body of people usually -- notably -- ungoverned." -Shepherd Book
  10. Mummy! by RebelWithoutAClue · · Score: 2, Funny

    I volunteer! I expect to return to terrorize the world in a few hundred years though.

    Wait, what do you mean life doesn't count as a terminal illness ?

    --
    "However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results" - Winston Churchill
  11. Re:why terminal? by coastal984 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Because obviously they'd like to get some filming done before May Sweeps... this is show business, you know. Can't be waiting for you to croak 20 or 30 years down the line...

  12. Fox Network by Lord_of_the_nerf · · Score: 2, Funny

    Maybe they could sweeten the pot and sign me up for any future 'When Monsters Attack' specials.

  13. Re:why terminal? by GrubLord · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Because they're looking to cash in on the morbid fascination of seeing a sexy, healthy-looking person who died of some non-obvious disease (such as certain cancers) get stripped down and cut to pieces.

    It's much less can't-look-away horrifying if they're cutting up an 80-year-old. Who'll want to buy ads in THAT half-hour?

  14. Re:What is next live executions? by DigiShaman · · Score: 4, Funny

    Why not? Assisted suicide live on TV? Think of the ratings!

    Why not turn it into a game show where you get to pick a vowel? We can call it "Hangman".

    (I'm so going to hell for that)

    --
    Life is not for the lazy.
  15. Re:Not a bad idea by Interoperable · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's for science!

    No, it's for "science."

    --
    So if this is the future...where's my jet pack?
  16. Good. by Cryacin · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So it's not just me that sees shows like Mythbusters as an intellectual version of Jackass.

    --
    Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
    1. Re:Good. by c6gunner · · Score: 4, Interesting

      So it's not just me that sees shows like Mythbusters as an intellectual version of Jackass.

      I'm pretty sure that was their intent, so no, you're definitely not the only one.

      Or, as Teller once put it when asked about their greatest achievement on "Bullshit":

      "Our greatest achievement is presenting skepticism to people with the assistance of obscenity and naked breasts and genitals."

      I'm sure Adam Savage would give a similar answer; just replace "obscenity and naked breasts and genitals" with "explosions and goofy antics".

    2. Re:Good. by MoonBuggy · · Score: 4, Funny

      Trite as it seems to quote XKCD (#397), it is appropriate as always: "Ideas are tested by experiment. That is the core of science. Everything else is bookkeeping."

    3. Re:Good. by jollyreaper · · Score: 2

      So it's not just me that sees shows like Mythbusters as an intellectual version of Jackass.

      Yes, except for the intellectual part.

      --
      Kwisatz Haderach
      Sell the spice to CHOAM
      This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
    4. Re:Good. by Gulthek · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I take it you didn't watch their most excellent deconstruction of just about every "we didn't land on the moon" myths? Or the recent one where they achieved an 10% fuel efficiency increase by adding golf ball-like dimples to the body of a car?

      Science isn't just theory, science is also getting out there, getting your hands dirty, and seeing what actually happens.

      I used to agree with you, then I actually watched more of the show.

      As usual, XKCD: http://xkcd.com/397/ At the time, I disagreed with this comic. Now, especially in the recent seasons, I completely agree.

  17. ...or do you want nana to meet Chuck Norris? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I much prefer the late, great prophet Bill Hicks' suggestion of recruiting the terminally as stunt fodder in action movies.

  18. Well, what's your diagnosis then? by jonaskoelker · · Score: 4, Funny

    I am "faced with the knowledge of my own terminal illness"

    I take it you've been diagnosed with the dreaded Alive, Well and Happy Syndrome, caused by a complex combination of healthy diet, regular exercise, a low to moderate alcohol consumption, a lack of tobacco or nicotine intake, frequent sexual intercourse and a supportive social network.

    Fortunately, it's in decline among US youth; see the article published in pubdot at http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=10/01/12/1337235

  19. Re:why terminal? by TapeCutter · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Here in Oz, SBS broadcast this series. Basically it was a live autopsy with the body hung in an upright posture by wires (facing away from the camera and live audience). The "can't-look-away horror" part for me was when he removed the brain, spinal cord and siatic nerve all in one piece.

    --
    And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
  20. All I can say is... by BancBoy · · Score: 5, Funny

    Tut tut tut...

    --
    [UID-HeinzIntel]
  21. I hereby volunteer Bill Gates for this one by H4x0r+Jim+Duggan · · Score: 2, Funny

    When you're making a TV show that needs a mummy army, just let me know

  22. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 2, Funny

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  23. Re:forget mummification, do an alcor freezing.. by FiloEleven · · Score: 2, Funny

    Actually these costs are really cheap for wealthy people, you would think that a lot more of these rich people who die of old age (lots of them around and many more rich baby boomers are in the pipeline.

    That was the most frustrating thing I've tried to parse all year. Tell me son, have they already liquefied your brains?

  24. Re:Not a bad idea by sFurbo · · Score: 2, Interesting

    1994. Hmm, this might be a better description.

  25. Dr. Bob Brier did this in 1994 by lemur3 · · Score: 5, Informative

    I remember watching this done on a modern human over 10 years years ago on discovery networks... it was very cool.

    from his wiki article:

    "In 1994, Brier and a colleague, Ronald Wade, director of the State Anatomy Board of Maryland, claimed to be the first people in 2,000 years to mummify a human cadaver using ancient Egyptian techniques. This research earned Brier the affectionate nickname "Mr. Mummy" and was also the subject of the National Geographic television special of the same name."

  26. Season 2 by aliquis · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Staring the most famous politicians of the world!

    Then do a follow up season with dictator leaders, soap opera celebrities, ..

  27. What the hell do you care? by KingSkippus · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What the hell do you care? It's not like you're going to be lying there thinking, "Aw man, this really sucks!"

    My family has approached me a few times about what I want to be done with my body when I die. My answer is always the same. I want what organs might be useful donated. After that, I really don't care. Bury me, cremate me, donate me to science, do whatever gives you what comfort and solace you need, because that's not me.

    When my mom passed away, which is by far the single most gut-wrenching experience I've ever been through in my life, that thought was the only thing that got me through the funeral without totally falling apart. My mom was a lot more than just the collection of organic molecules that lay before me, and she's gone. I appreciate the body that lay before me; it was her "house" for 60 years and allowed me to see her, talk to her, interact with her, and love her. But the house was now empty. Sad, for sure, but it wasn't the loss of the house I was mourning.

    So yeah, once I'm gone, you can pull my brains out through my nose and make gut soup for all I care. It was just my house, and I don't live there any more.

    1. Re:What the hell do you care? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      After that, I really don't care. Bury me, cremate me, donate me to science, do whatever gives you what comfort and solace you need, because that's not me.

      Assholes don't care. Here is an idea: Tell them what to do in writing same as you would communicate any wishes via a will with your possessions (whether a lot or a few). Otherwise, when you kick the bucket, your loved ones will be arguing over whether or not to spend $20,000 on a cemetary plot or leave you in dumpster behind Denny's. That corpse may not be "you", but it is your responsibility.

  28. another volunteer? by cashman73 · · Score: 2, Funny

    I heard that the "octo-mom" wants to do a reality show. How about we sign her up, call it "octo-mum"? Once she's mummified, we wouldn't have to listen to her anymore! Plus, she's already given us a head start with all that plastic surgery to make herself look like Angelina Jolie!

  29. Re:retarded actually by thelonious · · Score: 2, Insightful

    They weren't strange to the Aztecs!