50 Insane Facts About Death You Didn't Know

It is becoming more expensive and cremation offers lower costs and greater flexibility. But there is a common mistake. #23. Where is the ash? We've all

know

n someone who had grandma's ashes on the mantelpiece, haven't we? One of the most common misconceptions about cremation is that there are ashes involved, but what is actually returned to the family is not ashes at all. It is a fine powder generally

know

n as bone ash, but what it actually contains are the minerals from the bones. The powerful furnaces burn everything else clean and all that remains is the mineral content. Still, keep the cat away from the urn.

But it is not necessary for the ashes to remain on the mantle. #22. Go out in style Cremation ashes are sterile, non-toxic and odorless, meaning they can be safely incorporated into almost anything. So if you want a more permanent memory of a loved one, you can compress it into gemstones. If you want to celebrate their interests, the ashes can be mixed with paint or used in sheet music ink. And if you really want to send them out with a bang, companies can mix the remains with gunpowder and design a custom batch of fireworks—a perfect way to say goodbye to that rowdy uncle.

But a use of cremation remains can last much longer than the person. #twenty-one. Growing After Death For those who care about the environment, there is a way to leave a positive impact on the world after

death

. A person is cremated and their remains are placed in a biodegradable urn along with a tree seed. The urn is buried in a suitable location, the urn breaks down and opens into the ground, and a tree soon grows from the person's remains. After a few years, the tree becomes a perfect place for loved ones to gather under the shade provided by the deceased family member.

But all over the world, funeral rites take very unique forms. #twenty. Make It Loud Funerals are often solemn occasions, but in New Orleans you can mistake them for a party. With elements taken from African, French, and African-American traditions, these Big Easy funeral processions are led by a horn-playing big jazz band. At first they play traditional funeral music, but after the funeral, the tone changes and everyone lets loose. Joyous dance marches will be played, mourners will dance in the streets and bid farewell to their loved one in style. But not all the fun is reserved for those who are buried. #19.

Smoke and mirrors On the island of Bali, cremation can be a dramatic, all-day affair. Locals believe that cremation frees the soul and sends it to its next destination, so it is common for elaborate cremations and burnings to be performed publicly. But none was more dramatic than the cremation of the head of his royal family in 2008. His body was placed inside a huge wooden bull and burned in the presence of a giant dragon statue, in a mass funeral along with others. 68 dead. But some traditions are much more modern. #18. Fantasy Funeral Have you seen any footage of funerals in Ghana?

Those guys like to live it! Not only do they have fantastic dances, but they are known for a unique coffin industry called "Fantasy Coffins." They're like those race car beds you had when you were a kid, only forever. People are buried in decorated coffins that look like what they loved most in life, from a Mercedes-Benz for a rich man to a giant Bible for a particularly devout parishioner. In some cultures, traditions do not end with burial. #17. Turn, turn, turn In Madagascar, you will be surprised to see people digging a grave. These are not grave robbers or healers, they are the loved ones of the person in the grave.

The Malagasy people have a unique tradition where every seven years they exhume bones, wrap them in cloth, perform a ritual dance, and tell stories of the dead. If you think this probably smells terrible, you're right, which is why they start by sprinkling the bones with wine. This next tradition is not for the faint of heart. #sixteen. Sky Burial Buddhists believe that the body is not important after

death

, because the soul has migrated to a new being as part of reincarnation. Thus, they pay tribute to the dead and then cut him into pieces. Instead of burying it where it is of no use to anyone but the worms, they place the body on top of a mountain and let the vultures clean the bones.

While it is an ancient tradition, it is still regularly practiced in Tibet today. But few places have more unique funeral traditions than the Philippines. #fifteen. Smoke Them The Philippines has many ethnic groups and many of them have their own traditions. The Tinguian people have a strange tradition in which they renew their dead, dress them in the best clothing available, and then sit them in a chair at the memorial service. They then place a lit cigarette in their mouths. Hey, at least the dead seem relaxed. Another group has a very different tradition. #14. Hollow Land The Caviteno people live near the city of Manila, but their tradition is definitely not urban.

They bury their dead not in the ground, but in hollow tree trunks. But not just any tree. When a person knows that he is about to die due to illness or old age, he goes out and chooses his own funeral tree. It is even common for the person to live in a small cabin next to his death tree while his family works to empty it. But whatever the culture, death is the end of the road... right? #13. What comes next Belief in the afterlife is common throughout the world, and almost all religions have some concept of life after death.

Some believe in reincarnation, when each soul becomes a completely new person or other being after death. Others believe in ascending to a higher plane of existence or becoming part of some cosmic being. Others believe that the first thing you see after death is a judge to determine whether you have lived well enough to enter the afterlife. But there's no proof of any of this... right? #12. From the dead? Surprisingly, there are many people who claim to have seen what comes after death. These are usually people who almost died due to cardiac arrest and were resuscitated, either due to a heart attack or a surgical mishap.

They often claim to have seen a white light or heard voices. One boy, Colton Burpo, even reported seeing the sky and meeting people who were dead before he was born, and wrote a book about it with his father. But are these encounters in the afterlife proof of something, or are they simply tricks of the brain? #eleven. Closer to Earth Neuroscientists who have studied the brain at the time of death report that it releases an increased amount of hormones that cause positive feelings at the time of death. This means that near-death experiences could be caused by these hormones, making people feel peaceful and safe during their time of greatest distress.

But how does this explain why children know things they have no way of knowing? Well, skeptics point to an old-fashioned solution: Dad may be training his daughter. Harder to explain is the case of a woman who floated out of her body and saw a pair of sneakers on the hospital ceiling, only for a nurse to pick them up after she woke up. But has anyone seen... the other place? #10. Oh hell. People who claim to have seen the evil end in the afterlife are much rarer, but those who did return deeply disturbed. They report darkness, anguish and anguish, and some have become much more detailed.

When a man was shot in the head and spent a prolonged period in a coma, he woke up reporting that he had spent that time being tortured in a terrible realm of fire and hopelessness. While he had a religious awakening and wrote a book, most doctors believe this was a result of the brain trauma he suffered. But what do those who were closest to death have to say? #9. Back from the afterlife When Velma Thomas suffered a heart attack in 2008, she took a turn for the worse and was soon pronounced dead. Doctors tried to induce hypothermia to lower her body temperature, but it seemed useless and she was without brain activity for seventeen hours when they called her family to say goodbye to her.

But when she was taken off life support, did she suddenly start waking up? The fifty-nine-year-old woman eventually recovered and returned home, but when she was asked what she remembered from her time in the afterlife, her answer was...nothing. Death is universal, but a full life means something very different to different beings. #8. In the blink of an eye The average human life expectancy is around seventy years, solidly in the upper range of animals. But some animals live a full life in a much shorter time. Panther chameleons only live about a year, meaning that the previous generation almost completely disappears before the next generation hatches from their eggs.

Drone ants only live three weeks and die shortly after mating with the females. But nothing beats the mayfly, which is born with a purpose: to reproduce. They spend most of their time as nymphs and only have a total lifespan of twenty-four hours. But some animals can embarrass humans. #7. Heavy elephants are one of the few land mammals with a lifespan similar to that of humans. If you can't bear the thought of losing another pet, you might want to consider a macaw: these colorful birds can live up to eighty years. Bowhead whales are the longest living mammal, with a life expectancy of more than two hundred years;

One was even found with 19th century harpoon fragments still inside! But no large animal surpasses the Greenland shark, whose slow growth cycle means it can live up to five hundred years. But for the longest-lived organism of all, you'll have to leave the animal kingdom. #6. Standing Tall What is the longest time a living organism on Earth has escaped death? It would be found in the White Mountains of California: a mighty pine tree named Methuselah, after the notoriously long-lived biblical figure. How old is this tree? It is almost five thousand years old, meaning it stood tall on the North American continent even before the Great Pyramid of Giza was on the drawing board.

But is death really inevitable for everyone and everything? #5. A Tight Squeeze You may have heard a rumor that lobsters are immortal. Well, that's obviously not true: if they were, they wouldn't end up on plates. But these marine crustaceans do not die of old age. They shed their shells and grow a new one, essentially renewing their body periodically. The problem is that they eventually grow too big to escape their shell and end up trapped in an old one and dying that way. Not even the locust can escape. But a creature could have discovered the secret of immortality. #4.

The immortal jellyfish One species seems to have the process to avoid death indefinitely: Turritopsis Dohrnii, a small jellyfish found in oceans around the world. They have a complete life cycle, until they reach their dying jellyfish stage, at which point they avoid death by becoming a small ball of cells again that begins the life cycle again. So they renew their lives indefinitely, but are they really the same being or an identical clone? For a simple jellyfish, there really is no difference, but for a human being with a mind and personality, it is a much bigger issue. But will humans finally find a way to conquer death? #3.

The Deep Freeze Some people are already working on it. A cottage industry has emerged of people cryogenically freezing themselves, in the hope that they can eventually revive in the future. The law dictates that cryogenic freezing can only occur after the person is declared dead, and is most often practiced by those dying of incurable illnesses. At least two hundred and fifty people are frozen in the United States and 1,500 more have signed up. But contrary to rumors, Walt Disney was not one of them. But some people have talked about another way of life after death. #2. Living in the cloud The development of the digital world has led some people to wonder: can we live forever as digital thought forms?

The idea is that a process would be developed to read a person's brain patterns and upload them to the digital world, allowing the person's mind to continue existing after death. It sounds great, except the technology doesn't exist. While research continues, at this point it's more of a topic for science fiction stories. But while humans try to escape death, it keeps coming. #1. Keep Harvesting The good news for humanity is that the global birth rate continues to exceed the global death rate and the population continues to grow no matter what diseases exist. The bad news? Many people are dying from all kinds of causes.

The global mortality rate is estimated to be approximately 7.7 per thousand people, a little less than one percent of the population each year. Which means that a lotPeople look over their shoulders for death. To learn more about what happens after death, see "The Best Evidence for Life After Death" or watch this video.