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Spontaneous Human Combustion
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Posted By:
Glamcat
Feb 18, 2005
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Does anyone know anything about Spontaneous Human Combustion? I've always wondered if it was a real phenomenon or if it was just an urban legend.
Here's one article on it but there are lots more I'm sure.
http://www.crystalinks.com/shc.html
It just seems to me that if it's a real thing, how come they have such trouble proving it?
And how come clothes and the other objects generally don't burn, just the bodies? Also, they say that 80% of the victims are women, and it usually occurs after the person has been drinking. Go figure. Any thoughts?
Category: Death; Replies: 67 |
Comments
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Terry Austin
in California
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 04:32 PM
It's been explained, and demonstrated in a documentary by the BBC.
If a person who is clothed, or covered with a blanket, starts a small fire, and is either unconscious or unable to put the fire out, the heat of the small fire will start to melt the fat in their flesh. the melted fat then seeps in to the cloth covering them, in the same way melted wax in a candle seeps up the wick, and the victim becomes, basically, a human candle. They will burn for hours, consuming even the bones.
The filmed experiment took seven hours, and produced results indistinguishable from any of the classic spontaneous human combustion cases.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/158853.stm |
Nick
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 06:24 PM
doesn't explain unburnt surroundings- in one case a girls clothes remained totally intact, although subsequent tests revealed that the clothes burned very easily.
in another case a man was found in his home, sitting in an unburnt chair, only his head and feet being left behind. Seemingly, he had literally burnt to death from the outside in. |
Glamcat
Member
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 06:30 PM
It also doesn't explain how the fire gets started. |
Hairy Houdini
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 06:53 PM
beans |
Alex
in San Diego
Member
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 06:58 PM
I've always wondered if other species experience spontaneous combustion as well. Or is it just a human thing? |
Terry Austin
in California
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 07:08 PM
Actually, all the classic circumstances of SHC can be reproduced with the wick effect, including unburnt clothes.
How the fire starts is irrelevant. A dropped cigarette, or tipped over candle, and any of a thousand other perfectly ordinary accidents. |
Ga
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 07:57 PM
Yeah, I have to agree with Hairy on this one, but I'll go so far as to add cabbage to his beans.  |
Hairy Houdini
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 08:57 PM
He who ferments the passed is doomed to reheat it. |
Glamcat
Member
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 09:17 PM
Kinda like heartburn. I wonder if a Tums would put out the fire.
It's definitely a very strange phenomenon. Even stranger, on that page, is a link to something ever weirder that I've never even heard of,
Spontaneous Human Involuntary Invisibility! http://www.crystalinks.com/hsii.html
This is very bizarre! Has anyone heard of this before? |
Glamcat
Member
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 09:49 PM
http://www.alternativescience.com/spontaneous-human-combustion-burning-issue.htm
This is very interesting. Talks about the BBC test, the wick effect and why the experiment was actually pseudoscientific and misleading.
For example, in some of the documented cases, the bodies were totally consumed within a matter of minutes, not hours as the wick effect suggests.
"Almost incredibly, the reporters who made the film and the scientists who took part in it, chose to ignore completely the fact that there are a number of recent, well-documented cases of people who have experienced or witnessed spontaneous human combustion at first hand and who lived to tell what happened. And the first-hand experience of these witnesses completely contradicts the key features of the 'scientific explanation' in every detail."
I find this pretty fascinatng. I too wonder, Alex, if human beings are the only ones to experience this. But then it wouldn't be called SHC.
Also, it's interesting that it is usually women (probably b/c of their higher body fat), and that it always occurs indoors. Hmmm. |
Glamcat
Member
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Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2005 | 10:48 PM
http://www.randi.org/jr/031502.html
Scroll down the page a bit on this link.
Yet another viewpoint, the Amazing Randi. You can probably already guess what he thinks.
I asked a friend of mine, who is a nurse, what she thought and she said SHC is urban legend.
According to Randi's article, this only seems to happen in America and Great Britian. Interesting. Apparently you have to speak English in order to spontaneously combust. |
andymusicnyc
in brooklyn
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Posted: Sat Feb 19, 2005 | 05:11 PM
"Apparently, you have to speak English to spontaneously combust"...
It also helps if you're the drummer of a rock band. |
Myst
Member
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 | 12:03 AM
I'm going to test a theory. I'm going to drag my feet around on the carpet and see if I can generate enough static electricity to cause myself to spontaneously combust. If you don't hear from me after tomorrow you will know it worked.  |
Alex
in San Diego
Member
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 | 01:10 AM
For the love of God, Myst. Don't do it! |
Myst
Member
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 | 01:42 AM
Well I do live in dry Colorado, I could cause a very nasty bolt of static electricity if I get carried away, Hmmmm I shall have to be very careful.
Don't worry Alex, I am sure I will be fine. But just in case I plan on playing the song "Disco Inferno". I will go out in a blaze of disco glory!  |
Alex
in San Diego
Member
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 | 01:46 AM
just can't stop
when my spark gets hot... |
Myst
Member
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 | 02:15 AM
burn baby
burn it..... |
Maegan
in Tampa, FL - USA
Member
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 | 07:56 AM
There was a CSI episode about this. They burned a pig in a nightgown. It still didn't prove that SHC doesn't exist...just that cigarettes can kill you.
I have to agree w/ Randi about only English-speaking people combusting spontaneously. I've never heard of a German combusting.
This is probably one of those things that will never officially be proven or un-proven. If it happens to someone, they would be dead. They wouldn't be able to get on the evening news and talk about it. There don't seem to be any witnesses (usually the first sign of a hoax...) but that can be explained away by the fact that the witnesses are probably combusting right along with their English-speaking friends.
Or...it's only the non-English speaking people who are witnessing it & have found a way to prevent it. Not speaking English means that they are unable to share their findings w/ the English speaking populations. |
Myst
Member
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 | 04:58 PM
The static electricity theory is out. I'm still here.  |
Glamcat
Member
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Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 | 07:26 PM
I'm so glad you're still here Myst! Did you feel anything? Were you alone in the house, b/c you know, most of the victims seem to have been alone in their homes. It might not work if you're not alone. Also, having alcohol in your system seems to help. Did you have a drink before you tried it? Maybe you should get good and drunk and have another go. All in the name of science, of course. Then again, if you combusted, we wouldn't know about it would we? There would just be an empty space where there used to be a Myst. That would be terribly sad.
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