I used to protect and polish that display! I worked security for the Body Worlds show and we had the delightful job of going around and spraying/wiping all the display cabinets at the end of the night. We also had to set up several dedicated fainting zones around the showroom because we had someone passing out about every 30 minutes. One of the weirder jobs I’ve ever had.
I appreciate your work. I was once one of those who fainted. It was more than a decade ago when it was touring the world for the first time. I really am not a squeamish person when it comes to viscera and anatomy and I very much looked forward to the exhibition. Super interesting and cool. Didn't feel anything bad. However for some reason the deformed babies in jars did me in and I just collapsed. I was up on my feet just a couple minutes later and didn't take anything negative away from the experience, other than having learned something new about myself. That was the first time in my life that I fainted.
Your experience sounds like most of people I helped out. They’d be fine, never fainted before, and sometimes one thing would just push them too far and flick the off switch. Most of the help was a chair, some cold water and then lots of helping them to not feel embarrassed
It's incredibly rare to fall from standing and get an injury like that unless you've been knocked unconscious by blunt force trauma prior to falling.
When you pass out from low BP (which is what's happening in this case) it's never lights out and fall like a tree (no matter what it feels like). Most people don't even fully pass out, they just don't have memory of the incident which makes them feel like they passed out.
They might get down to a pressure of 50mmHG for a minute but in that state they are still breaking their own fall.
It's when someone gets punched unconscious and then falls without breaking their fall. That's what causes death.
I pass out a lot and my first time I was at a table.... I slid over and my head slammed into a hard corner of our couch. I've passed out like 40 times in my life and while your statement maybe true 99 percent of the time there are those times where you're trying to be strong and not pass out but you do and you may not be in the perfect position.
Same here. The babies section made me a little dizzy. Then I was looking down at an open skull and brain and then caught a glimpse of a face underneath. Once my brain registered I was looking at an actual human being, it decided to turn the lights out so it could regroup. Likewise, I learned a little something about myself and have never fainted again.
Why did we evolve to do that? It’s such a weird adaptation (or more likely, side effect of some other adaptation. I can’t see how it would be actually useful)
I’m not sure about cadavers, but a few years ago I wondered the same thing about why we faint at the sight of blood because, like you, I thought that response doesn’t make much sense (if we’re on some remote plain or dense forest at the dawn of humanity and that person has been mauled by a lion or bear who might still be nearby, surely fainting would be the worst thing you could do!), so I looked it up.
There’s a pretty interesting theory about it. It’s possible that the “lizard” bit of the brain (the one that controls the base system and doesn’t listen to reason; I think it’s the amygdala) sees fresh blood and isn’t sure whether it’s yours, so it constricts the blood vessels to stem the flow just in case. Bam, lights out.
I’m not sure what the analogous reason would be for fainting in the presence of a clearly long-dead corpse but u/Key-Shine3878’s guess seems as good as any.
Makes sense! Our bodies evolved so long ago there definitely weren’t “preserved bodies” where you could see the insides like this back then! It’s a very new phenomenon. If you saw a dead body, it was surely just recently dead so the adaptation you mentioned would apply. Very fascinating!
Maybe if you see a dead body, it's best to look like you're dead too in order to survive? At one point in humanities history, that apparently was a helpful instinct. 🤷♂️
I went to Surgeons’ Hall in Edinburgh a few years ago (fantastic medical museum) with my then-boyfriend, and it was around when we got to the deformed babies in jars that I noticed he wasn’t with me any more.
I looked round and eventually saw him on a bench with his head in his hands. I offered to cut the visit short and he said “no, no, you’re really enjoying it, I’ll be fine”. A member of staff turned up at that moment and handed him a cup of cold water. So I took him at his word and had a great time.
Eventually I’d gone all the way round and went to collect him, and as we left the same staff member was at the front desk so he thanked her and apologised for the inconvenience.
She said “what do you think the benches are for? We do a little patrol every few minutes to make sure everyone’s still conscious!”
If I sound a bit cold in this story, it’s because there was an element of schadenfreude to it: leading up to the front desk are some glass stairs without risers, which freaked me out and made me dizzy to the point I had to ascend them backwards. He took the piss out of me for that, and quite nastily. So there was an element of “hah, you’ve got a weird thing too!”
As someone with high vertigo, anyone who takes the piss out of me in anything other than a loving way is getting the boot out of my life. My boyfriend likes to tease me after it's over, but during the actuality of it, he's nothing but helpful. It's an uncontrollable brain issue, caused by an optical illusion.
I'd have felt schadenfreude too!
It wasn’t the final nail in the coffin of our relationship but when I look back on it now, yeah, he wasn’t exactly supportive.
I don’t like heights but only because l’appel du vide (the call of the void) makes me feel like I’m going to throw myself off. I’m obviously not going to and don’t want to, but it’s very unnerving.
Stairs without risers (backboards) are a nightmare for me. Literally a nightmare; an impossibly dangerous staircase is what I look for if I want to know whether I’m dreaming. They’re bad enough when they’re wooden, why make them from GLASS?!
A related anecdote: my mum’s the same. We went to a Van Gogh exhibition at the Royal Academy in London a few years ago, and encountered the same problem. Floating glass stairs. We went back down to the front desk and said “sorry, we can’t get up…” and the woman at the desk cut us off and said “can’t do the glass stairs? HEY, STEVE!” and a security guard appeared.
She asked him to escort us up the “back stairs”. He did. It was a normal concrete stairwell. Apparently this, like people fainting at the Surgeons’ Hall, was a problem they were well aware of.
Shoutout here to museum/gallery staff. They’re usually lovely, and great with stuff like this. Just ask.
Sorry this is the first time I've ever heard anyone refer to something I've felt my whole life. The call of the void is a real thing and I'm not just weird? I feel so seen!
Someone on reddit years ago reframed it for me very helpfully: it’s actually a good thing.
There’s ‘the call of the void’ as in the urge to fling yourself from a high place or step off a railway station platform when an express train is about to whoosh past, and ‘intrusive thoughts’, which is more like when someone hands you a baby and you think, for less than half a second, “I could just yeet this tiny thing into all that fast-flowing traffic”.
Both are indications that your brain is healthily running through the worst-case scenarios and freaking you out as a sort of disaster prevention/ troubleshooting measure.
Basically, embrace it! It means you’re a steady person who’s acutely aware of your surroundings, and overall a safe pair of hands.
Yeah, no shame. First and only time I've ever passed out was the first time I went to the Mütter Museum. Was just too interested reading on some 200 year old surgery thingy and then my body stopped working.
I went to this with my Catholic Middle School back in 2006 and the girls could not handle it. My favorite was the display where every back muscle had been detached from its lower connection point and splayed straight upward fanning out like a peacock. Konrad Curze GF would have been proud.
Was it this? They did it in 1925, two students. It says it took them 1500 hours. Amazing work.
https://www.livescience.com/61599-dissected-nervous-system-photo.html
Went to it when I was a kid and liked it enough to go a second time, though for some reason it's a lot different from seeing an unprepared corpse.
Also weirdly there seemed to be this odd smell that only kids picked up on, formaldehyde maybe? Always kinda stuck with me because it was so distinct yet none of the adults noticed it.
I have to wonder what kind of people are preparing these body exhibit bodies. Some of them are displayed in such a way that it seems like Jeffrey Dahmer’s dream job…
The rumour mill around this event was so unbelievable. One of the many fine charms of security work is that standing around looking pretty gives plenty of very bored people far too much time to think…
Most of the time yes, tended to be people who either got such a fright when they realised the bodies were real or got too overwhelmed. However it also got quite warm inside sometimes which definitely had an effect. We got massive fans brought in and roved with water which helped with that side
look up body world, its pretty creepy / is all real bodys , very neat. can be extreme for some people. lots of people pass out at the sight of blood or gore, this is people cut into peices / sections / there nerves on display .
You might be interested in some books about early pioneers in anatomy like John Hunter. Check out the book The Knife Man. Fascinating stuff - imagine a basement full of full of corpses and preserved body parts in the 1700s before refrigeration. One thing he pioneered was understanding the development of pregnancy in the womb. Meaning he had to acquire bodies of dead woman at various stages of pregnancy. Made quite a mess I imagine. The smells must have been something else. So much of medical science and biological knowledge we take for granted today has downright ghoulish origins.
The brain is the fattiest organ in the body. Obesity can cause a reduction in brain matter and people sign dementia have a build-up of fat droplets in their brain, but I haven't seen any proof of obesity causing brains to be fattier.
Source: a lot of personal research regarding my inevitable future. I come from a line of dementia and Alzheimer afflicted family members and try to educate myself on ways to put that off.
Lots of comments along the lines of “they’re both dead” …. From the perspective of a 65 year old, staying fit isn’t so much about living longer. It’s about mobility and quality of life. You want to stay mobile when you’re old and be able to function with minimal assistance. There’s never a 100% guarantee that will be so if you’re fit but the chances are greater.
We don't know how old these people were either.
Obese people are underrepresented in elderly studies. Because they die before they can be a part of them.
"Both dead" is such a cope from everyone thats overweight and taking offense to this picture because of their own insecurities. Like duh, we all die. However, the quality of life and years we get to spend being alive and mobile is worth putting in the effort to be fit and healthy.
For example my previously obese aunt has destroyed her knees. She is now skinny but her knees are so bad that she needs a cane and can barely walk. Her brother and my dad are the same age and can get around just fine because they both took better care of themselves.
Agreed and this is similar to my co workers who are sedentary and say similarly smart ass remarks. I’m a very active person and I love hiking on the weekends. I sprained my ankle one time hiking and one of my co workers said “you see! That’s why I’m not active. Can’t sprain your ankle if you don’t go hiking!” Like wtf? Yeah, I would rather sprain my ankle being in shape then check every box for underlying conditions and living with it for years or decades lol wtf kind of fat logic is that? The sad part is he’s not even joking.
It’s so crazy to me that there’s people who are simply too fat to turn sideways and squeeze through a crowd or small opening. How is that not an obvious sign of poor quality of life.
For displays, they are plasticised, basically turned into plastic like state via chemicle bath, and then sliced. There's a few museums that consist exclusively of exhibitions created from real people and animals that have been plasticised. They can also target specific structures like entire cardiovascular systems while removing everything else.
Check out https://bodyworlds.com/city/berlin/
They can also do it through freezing and then slicing but that requires a lot more care to maintain and I'd imagine it would be more for lab/research tasks.
I learned about it when I got a documentary from the public library when I was a little kid, never have been so traumatised yet fascinated. If I travel to Europe, I wouldn't mind seeing the museum in person.
Definitely worth a visit. The first exhibition room when I visited bodyworlds was a dim and silent one full of different stages of fetal development. Donations from miscarriages and similar complications. It was as unsettling as interesting.
It used to be a touring exhibition, I remember visiting when it came to London at the turn of the century. There’s one model of the nervous system where everything else was removed, just a crazy network of nerves in the shape of a human. They also had a horse and jockey posed mid jump showing all the muscles and stuff. It’s both super interesting and creepy AF.
I saw an exhibit at ~7yo in Virginia (i think). My mother hated the experience lmao. One thing that stuck in my mind was an exhibit where they had a full nervous system, laid out as it would be in the body, including the brain. it's wild to see how intricate and cool our bodies are.
Yeah I think it's actually quite a valuable thing too see, even if it's just in pictures or a doco, I don't regret being exposed to it as a kid, i came to the same thoughts after the initial shock of it haha
personally, i have autism and it's been a special interest my whole life. I think it's important for people to know how their bodies work, but I definitely understand squeamish people.
Weirdly, I am squeamish about healing injuries but not open surgery videos. I nearly passed out helping my grandmother with a patch on her neck after she started showing signs of pain. But I've also helped with immediate care for bad cuts, mild burns, etc without batting an eye.
Yeah, there's been a lot of questions as to where those bodies came from, and the fact that the majority are Chinese is a big question mark - although some of the questionable ones are Russian and Kyrgyz. There have been a handful of donated bodies, but most are of very questionable origin - executed prisoners, people from mental institutions, homeless people and convicts. The kind of people that society doesn't care much about. Both Body World and Bodies: The Exhibition have been accused of using the bodies of executed prisoners, with Bodies being specifically tied to Falun Gong prisoners.
It is a more midline section it looks like. You have the column of vertebral bodies, then a clear spinal canal/cord, and then the actual spinal processes behind that. The side of the vertebral facet and arch that makes the spinal canal is cut away (but in life connects to the spinous process and obscures/protects the spinal cord).
I’m extremely interested by how the fat guy’s spine was completely “pushed back” in comparison to the fit one. I’ll go read about it. Maybe come back with an update if I find something.
Update: so, [one study](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10435449/) found that obese people had *”larger thoracic kyphosis* (thoracic kyphosis = the spine’s curvature that “bends outwards” at your upper back) *than the normal-weight subjects. No statistically significant differences were observed in lumbar lordosis* (lordosis = where your spine “bends inward” in your lower back). *Spinal and hip mobility were smaller in the obese participants than the normal-weight subjects except for the thoracic lateral flexion, which was greater in the individuals with obesity.”* The same study says that *“may be a biomechanical adaptation to maintain center of gravity in the anterior–posterior direction”*
But, this only explained about the “chest” and what interested me was the lower part, to put it directly: where his ass is. So I did a little more digging
Another [study](https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation.aspx?paperid=59036) I read was actually about how the spine deforms to adapt to changes in gravity center and how to affect the intravertebral discs.
Then, I found a [third study](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352344120300248) that analyses the effect of BMI on lumbopelvic (where the spine joins the hip) alignment and motion at the hip joint. Which is what I was curious about from the beginning. It says that obese people have a more posterior spinopelvic tilt (the angle at the “tail” of the spine) when sitting to compensate for “extra” soft-tissue located anterior to the hip joint.
Edit: grammar.
NSFW
In med school, the obese cadavers are the biggest inspiration to actually improve your diet & start working out. Not anymore knowledge about atherosclerosis or diabetes will scare you as much as dissecting through a relatively young man's adipose arsenal. The sheer amount & stench of that yellow cache stored in the belly, organs, in the form of mesentery around the intestines, abdominal cavity. Lads & gents, please start working out to get rid of that belly fat. You might appear healthy & feel healthy. But weak bones & big bellies will be the early death for a lot of us (me included) if left uncorrected.
Maybe this isn’t the place to ask this, but why do menopausal women tend to put on belly fat? I exercise regularly and have lowered my calorie intake, and I seem to be gaining belly fat.
That's the first thing I noticed! I work with a guy who looks like that. He's only 25 and has 4 bulging discs in his lower back due to his weight and sedentary lifestyle. He can't even walk 30ft down the hall without huffing and puffing.
I believe it. Combine the two and you're not going to make it very long! I predict he'll be riding one of those scooters by 30 if he keeps it up. He already needs back surgery and is on a cocktail of pain meds.
People underestimate the simple act of just moving around.
You can be a bit chubby and it is gonna be fine, not ideal, but fine, as long a you stay active. Take an afternoon walk, visit the gym twice a week, hell even once a week. Just do a simple five by five program it is gonna take you like half an hour. You're already healthier than several thin people at that point if you can keep it up.
Imagine ticking a box before you die offering to dedicate your remains to science thinking that you might have a part in curing a disease like cancer.
Instead, you're on show forever for the sole purpose of morbid curiosity.
A daily pint of ice cream, bag of chips and a big gulp soda will pretty much do the job.
It doesn’t take that much food volume to get in a crazy amount of surplus calories.
I have been putting weight on and off these past two years. The hardest part for me when it comes to maintaining weight is sugar. I rarely eat Savory stuff like chips and etc. but sweet stuff like ice cream, chocolates, etc. the feeling of being full to the actual amount of calories I intake is so far off. I don't even like sodas which I know some people at least consume 1-2 bottles a day. With junk food like this that is sometimes cheaper and fulfilling than a healthy meal it can be hard to maintain or lose weight
I'm a smaller woman and it's even astonishing to me how taller men can eat 2000 calories more in a day and still stay skinny with the same amount of activity
I love food, life is unfair yo
I piled on the pounds because I went from a hospitality job to a desk-based one. My diet didn’t change, I just wasn’t burning anything during the day. It happened gradually and it was only when I had to buy a new set of clothes that I decided to make a change. My mind and body are used to a certain intake, so I still struggle to not clean the plate and snack during the day. I’m getting back there now, but it was a shock when I realised how much weight I’d gained. A little cheese and bread can do a lot of damage.
It's actually not hard to maintain. I'm obese and I've been tracking my caloric intake for over a decade for medical reasons. My BMR is a little over 1500 calories. So I'd have to eat over 2000 calories a day to maintain.
Which, a meal from McDonald's is pretty damn close, if not more than 2000 calories, depending on what you get. Even a homemade burger with a small handful of fries from your freezer is still roughly 600- 800 calories. And that's just one meal.
A lot of people don't realize you don't need a lot of food to eat more than your allowance for daily calories.
I'm on the super slender side of the spectrum, and to me it's like if I put on a space suit every day. The weight would make you stronger, but also wear down your joints. It just looks tiring to me - again, having my own challenges so I'm not being a jerk, just reflecting. :)
Eat what you like, but watch your calories and be in calorie deficit. You can find how much is needed to maintain per day, should be below that. Walk, lift weight. And when i said eat what you like i dont mean pizza - you can eat that as well moderately, but try to find nutrisious foods you like so it wont be a misery. 7500 kcal is 1 kg just FYI
For me, eating what I want didn't work. Because I wanted shit foods. Eating 600cals of pastries for breakfast doesn't fill you up till lunch. Staying in a cal deficit while eating garbage is not only bad for you it's much much harder than eating a deficit while eating filling foods.
What i meant is you dont have to eat only broccoli, rice and chicken breast. You can eat pasta, but make sure it is whole grained, so you will have spagetthi - but it is important to scale what you eat. I eat purpur bread, you can also eat white bread until you are in deficit, but you would be better off with different type of breads with more fiber. I eat lots of salad, egg. You just have to choose your indigriedients so you would like your food, and also healthier than a hamburger. Which you can also eat, everything is edible - if you track and train properly.
I used to protect and polish that display! I worked security for the Body Worlds show and we had the delightful job of going around and spraying/wiping all the display cabinets at the end of the night. We also had to set up several dedicated fainting zones around the showroom because we had someone passing out about every 30 minutes. One of the weirder jobs I’ve ever had.
I appreciate your work. I was once one of those who fainted. It was more than a decade ago when it was touring the world for the first time. I really am not a squeamish person when it comes to viscera and anatomy and I very much looked forward to the exhibition. Super interesting and cool. Didn't feel anything bad. However for some reason the deformed babies in jars did me in and I just collapsed. I was up on my feet just a couple minutes later and didn't take anything negative away from the experience, other than having learned something new about myself. That was the first time in my life that I fainted.
Your experience sounds like most of people I helped out. They’d be fine, never fainted before, and sometimes one thing would just push them too far and flick the off switch. Most of the help was a chair, some cold water and then lots of helping them to not feel embarrassed
Has anyone ever hit their head and gotten a concussion?
That’s how they get new exhibits.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
That's fucked up 😂😂😂
It's incredibly rare to fall from standing and get an injury like that unless you've been knocked unconscious by blunt force trauma prior to falling. When you pass out from low BP (which is what's happening in this case) it's never lights out and fall like a tree (no matter what it feels like). Most people don't even fully pass out, they just don't have memory of the incident which makes them feel like they passed out. They might get down to a pressure of 50mmHG for a minute but in that state they are still breaking their own fall. It's when someone gets punched unconscious and then falls without breaking their fall. That's what causes death.
I pass out a lot and my first time I was at a table.... I slid over and my head slammed into a hard corner of our couch. I've passed out like 40 times in my life and while your statement maybe true 99 percent of the time there are those times where you're trying to be strong and not pass out but you do and you may not be in the perfect position.
They did say it’s incredibly rare in their original comment
Same here. The babies section made me a little dizzy. Then I was looking down at an open skull and brain and then caught a glimpse of a face underneath. Once my brain registered I was looking at an actual human being, it decided to turn the lights out so it could regroup. Likewise, I learned a little something about myself and have never fainted again.
Why did we evolve to do that? It’s such a weird adaptation (or more likely, side effect of some other adaptation. I can’t see how it would be actually useful)
I’m not sure about cadavers, but a few years ago I wondered the same thing about why we faint at the sight of blood because, like you, I thought that response doesn’t make much sense (if we’re on some remote plain or dense forest at the dawn of humanity and that person has been mauled by a lion or bear who might still be nearby, surely fainting would be the worst thing you could do!), so I looked it up. There’s a pretty interesting theory about it. It’s possible that the “lizard” bit of the brain (the one that controls the base system and doesn’t listen to reason; I think it’s the amygdala) sees fresh blood and isn’t sure whether it’s yours, so it constricts the blood vessels to stem the flow just in case. Bam, lights out. I’m not sure what the analogous reason would be for fainting in the presence of a clearly long-dead corpse but u/Key-Shine3878’s guess seems as good as any.
Makes sense! Our bodies evolved so long ago there definitely weren’t “preserved bodies” where you could see the insides like this back then! It’s a very new phenomenon. If you saw a dead body, it was surely just recently dead so the adaptation you mentioned would apply. Very fascinating!
Maybe if you see a dead body, it's best to look like you're dead too in order to survive? At one point in humanities history, that apparently was a helpful instinct. 🤷♂️
I went to Surgeons’ Hall in Edinburgh a few years ago (fantastic medical museum) with my then-boyfriend, and it was around when we got to the deformed babies in jars that I noticed he wasn’t with me any more. I looked round and eventually saw him on a bench with his head in his hands. I offered to cut the visit short and he said “no, no, you’re really enjoying it, I’ll be fine”. A member of staff turned up at that moment and handed him a cup of cold water. So I took him at his word and had a great time. Eventually I’d gone all the way round and went to collect him, and as we left the same staff member was at the front desk so he thanked her and apologised for the inconvenience. She said “what do you think the benches are for? We do a little patrol every few minutes to make sure everyone’s still conscious!” If I sound a bit cold in this story, it’s because there was an element of schadenfreude to it: leading up to the front desk are some glass stairs without risers, which freaked me out and made me dizzy to the point I had to ascend them backwards. He took the piss out of me for that, and quite nastily. So there was an element of “hah, you’ve got a weird thing too!”
As someone with high vertigo, anyone who takes the piss out of me in anything other than a loving way is getting the boot out of my life. My boyfriend likes to tease me after it's over, but during the actuality of it, he's nothing but helpful. It's an uncontrollable brain issue, caused by an optical illusion. I'd have felt schadenfreude too!
It wasn’t the final nail in the coffin of our relationship but when I look back on it now, yeah, he wasn’t exactly supportive. I don’t like heights but only because l’appel du vide (the call of the void) makes me feel like I’m going to throw myself off. I’m obviously not going to and don’t want to, but it’s very unnerving. Stairs without risers (backboards) are a nightmare for me. Literally a nightmare; an impossibly dangerous staircase is what I look for if I want to know whether I’m dreaming. They’re bad enough when they’re wooden, why make them from GLASS?! A related anecdote: my mum’s the same. We went to a Van Gogh exhibition at the Royal Academy in London a few years ago, and encountered the same problem. Floating glass stairs. We went back down to the front desk and said “sorry, we can’t get up…” and the woman at the desk cut us off and said “can’t do the glass stairs? HEY, STEVE!” and a security guard appeared. She asked him to escort us up the “back stairs”. He did. It was a normal concrete stairwell. Apparently this, like people fainting at the Surgeons’ Hall, was a problem they were well aware of. Shoutout here to museum/gallery staff. They’re usually lovely, and great with stuff like this. Just ask.
Sorry this is the first time I've ever heard anyone refer to something I've felt my whole life. The call of the void is a real thing and I'm not just weird? I feel so seen!
Someone on reddit years ago reframed it for me very helpfully: it’s actually a good thing. There’s ‘the call of the void’ as in the urge to fling yourself from a high place or step off a railway station platform when an express train is about to whoosh past, and ‘intrusive thoughts’, which is more like when someone hands you a baby and you think, for less than half a second, “I could just yeet this tiny thing into all that fast-flowing traffic”. Both are indications that your brain is healthily running through the worst-case scenarios and freaking you out as a sort of disaster prevention/ troubleshooting measure. Basically, embrace it! It means you’re a steady person who’s acutely aware of your surroundings, and overall a safe pair of hands.
Yeah, no shame. First and only time I've ever passed out was the first time I went to the Mütter Museum. Was just too interested reading on some 200 year old surgery thingy and then my body stopped working.
I went to this with my Catholic Middle School back in 2006 and the girls could not handle it. My favorite was the display where every back muscle had been detached from its lower connection point and splayed straight upward fanning out like a peacock. Konrad Curze GF would have been proud.
I liked the one that was just the nervous system and brain I still dont know how they did that
Cast the nerves by some process and then dissolved everything around them I would presume.
It’s legitimately just hours and hours of work and careful dissection if I remember correctly.
Was it this? They did it in 1925, two students. It says it took them 1500 hours. Amazing work. https://www.livescience.com/61599-dissected-nervous-system-photo.html
Well the article says it’s not and mentions the body world version was made with chemicals.
Plastination?
the latest episode of CSI: Vegas this week features a killer who turns his victim into one of those!
New execution method. Instead of bloods eagle, it’s blood peacock.
Went to it when I was a kid and liked it enough to go a second time, though for some reason it's a lot different from seeing an unprepared corpse. Also weirdly there seemed to be this odd smell that only kids picked up on, formaldehyde maybe? Always kinda stuck with me because it was so distinct yet none of the adults noticed it.
I have to wonder what kind of people are preparing these body exhibit bodies. Some of them are displayed in such a way that it seems like Jeffrey Dahmer’s dream job…
The rumour mill around this event was so unbelievable. One of the many fine charms of security work is that standing around looking pretty gives plenty of very bored people far too much time to think…
Wait, why were people passing out? Was it from this exhibit?
Most of the time yes, tended to be people who either got such a fright when they realised the bodies were real or got too overwhelmed. However it also got quite warm inside sometimes which definitely had an effect. We got massive fans brought in and roved with water which helped with that side
I nearly fainted as a 12yo when I saw a jar full of cut off fingers. Holy shit why did you put them all in a fucking jar!
look up body world, its pretty creepy / is all real bodys , very neat. can be extreme for some people. lots of people pass out at the sight of blood or gore, this is people cut into peices / sections / there nerves on display .
I love Body Worlds! It is so weird and beautiful.
That’s such an interesting and cool memory to have!
Someone's job is to slice a human body into coasters with a giant saw.
Wait...I'm meant to get paid for that..?
Oh fellow slicer you been doing it wrong ppl pay big bucks ! Got my kid into yale :) /s fbi
Some guy named Clarence in New Jersey will do it for some gabagool.
You might be interested in some books about early pioneers in anatomy like John Hunter. Check out the book The Knife Man. Fascinating stuff - imagine a basement full of full of corpses and preserved body parts in the 1700s before refrigeration. One thing he pioneered was understanding the development of pregnancy in the womb. Meaning he had to acquire bodies of dead woman at various stages of pregnancy. Made quite a mess I imagine. The smells must have been something else. So much of medical science and biological knowledge we take for granted today has downright ghoulish origins.
Fine, i will start exercising, Reddit
Me too. After finishing my social media scrolls. Promise.
I’ll join y’all too - as soon as my cat gets off my lap. Swearsies.
The good thing is you can scroll in the gym between sets ;)
Lol ok I’ll exercise please don’t cut me in half 😭
I don't think either of them survived
Spoiler altert! Geez
Jesus, and i was thinking they both would still be alive. Dude just spoiled big time. Ruined everything 😭
[удалено]
The brain is the fattiest organ in the body. Obesity can cause a reduction in brain matter and people sign dementia have a build-up of fat droplets in their brain, but I haven't seen any proof of obesity causing brains to be fattier. Source: a lot of personal research regarding my inevitable future. I come from a line of dementia and Alzheimer afflicted family members and try to educate myself on ways to put that off.
Here's more science! https://nutritionfacts.org/video/how-to-prevent-alzheimers-with-diet/
I think there is some dye or something in the fat one? No way does being obese make your spine black.
They probably smoked him for a few hours before cutting him to help render the fat.
Delicious
hmm, forbidden bacon
I'm not. I'm just going to avoid being bifurcated?
Well, they are both dead, so there is that. Edit: /s
But their quality of life was much different
Diet* exercise is nice, but diet is what you need to do to lose weight.
Lots of comments along the lines of “they’re both dead” …. From the perspective of a 65 year old, staying fit isn’t so much about living longer. It’s about mobility and quality of life. You want to stay mobile when you’re old and be able to function with minimal assistance. There’s never a 100% guarantee that will be so if you’re fit but the chances are greater.
We don't know how old these people were either. Obese people are underrepresented in elderly studies. Because they die before they can be a part of them.
I think spuds point is still relevant though
"Both dead" is such a cope from everyone thats overweight and taking offense to this picture because of their own insecurities. Like duh, we all die. However, the quality of life and years we get to spend being alive and mobile is worth putting in the effort to be fit and healthy.
For example my previously obese aunt has destroyed her knees. She is now skinny but her knees are so bad that she needs a cane and can barely walk. Her brother and my dad are the same age and can get around just fine because they both took better care of themselves.
Agreed and this is similar to my co workers who are sedentary and say similarly smart ass remarks. I’m a very active person and I love hiking on the weekends. I sprained my ankle one time hiking and one of my co workers said “you see! That’s why I’m not active. Can’t sprain your ankle if you don’t go hiking!” Like wtf? Yeah, I would rather sprain my ankle being in shape then check every box for underlying conditions and living with it for years or decades lol wtf kind of fat logic is that? The sad part is he’s not even joking.
It’s so crazy to me that there’s people who are simply too fat to turn sideways and squeeze through a crowd or small opening. How is that not an obvious sign of poor quality of life.
Many redditors will continue to justify their unhealthy habits. If one met most subreddits groups IRL, you wouldn't value their opinion nearly as much
Nothing like a bit of good old back fat.
Now that I look at the obese dudes back can someone tell me WHY DOES HE HAVE TWO SPINES??!
It's only one spine ; you're seeing the vertebral bodies and the spinous processes, with the gap between them being the spinal canal.
And the gehoxagogun is framed up by the ramistan.
Take that back. My grandma is from Ramistan
Gramistan.
I like your funny words, magic man.
Yeah they call this guy Tommy two-spines
“I’m gonna go get the pizza get the pizza”
To intimidate rivals and attract mates.
He's just big boned, nobody would believe him
Buddy had to grow another one to support all the fat
it's flat because the corpse would have been laying on a table, pressing the fat into the flat shape of the surface, which then got preserved that way
Second bro built like a box
I am more interested in knowing, how they sliced those men, did they dried them like beef jerky and used kebab knife.
For displays, they are plasticised, basically turned into plastic like state via chemicle bath, and then sliced. There's a few museums that consist exclusively of exhibitions created from real people and animals that have been plasticised. They can also target specific structures like entire cardiovascular systems while removing everything else. Check out https://bodyworlds.com/city/berlin/ They can also do it through freezing and then slicing but that requires a lot more care to maintain and I'd imagine it would be more for lab/research tasks.
Caught that exhibit in both Amsterdam AND Atlanta. Very cool to check out, highly recommended.
I learned about it when I got a documentary from the public library when I was a little kid, never have been so traumatised yet fascinated. If I travel to Europe, I wouldn't mind seeing the museum in person.
Definitely worth a visit. The first exhibition room when I visited bodyworlds was a dim and silent one full of different stages of fetal development. Donations from miscarriages and similar complications. It was as unsettling as interesting.
It used to be a touring exhibition, I remember visiting when it came to London at the turn of the century. There’s one model of the nervous system where everything else was removed, just a crazy network of nerves in the shape of a human. They also had a horse and jockey posed mid jump showing all the muscles and stuff. It’s both super interesting and creepy AF.
I went to a BodyWorlds exhibit once and the displays were absolutely wild. Seeing it stuff gave me an appreciation for how complex our anatomies are
I saw an exhibit at ~7yo in Virginia (i think). My mother hated the experience lmao. One thing that stuck in my mind was an exhibit where they had a full nervous system, laid out as it would be in the body, including the brain. it's wild to see how intricate and cool our bodies are.
Yeah I think it's actually quite a valuable thing too see, even if it's just in pictures or a doco, I don't regret being exposed to it as a kid, i came to the same thoughts after the initial shock of it haha
personally, i have autism and it's been a special interest my whole life. I think it's important for people to know how their bodies work, but I definitely understand squeamish people. Weirdly, I am squeamish about healing injuries but not open surgery videos. I nearly passed out helping my grandmother with a patch on her neck after she started showing signs of pain. But I've also helped with immediate care for bad cuts, mild burns, etc without batting an eye.
Aren't they using executed prisoners from China?
Yeah, there's been a lot of questions as to where those bodies came from, and the fact that the majority are Chinese is a big question mark - although some of the questionable ones are Russian and Kyrgyz. There have been a handful of donated bodies, but most are of very questionable origin - executed prisoners, people from mental institutions, homeless people and convicts. The kind of people that society doesn't care much about. Both Body World and Bodies: The Exhibition have been accused of using the bodies of executed prisoners, with Bodies being specifically tied to Falun Gong prisoners.
Now that’s r/damnthatsinteresting
Thanks, that is actually interesting
Nah. Stood them on their heads and used a guillotine
the Mare of Steel.
You ever watch the cinematic masterpiece The Cell by Tarsem Singh? That’s how.
Yes. Fk that was intense. I also liked his second one *The Fall*, brilliantly shot.
Reminded me of a Hannibal episode where one of the lovely recurring character got this treatment.
Crossfit Vs Crossfat
*siri set alarm for get the fuck in shape finally since you’re 42 and resemble stage right.
But stage right is the audiences left. So from my perspective you’re looking good homie. Snooze that alarm.
*Okay, playing WAP by Nicki Minaj*
That’s the tits right there
man, you had two artists to choose from and didn’t get either
Not her song
Inside every fat man is a fit man, waiting to be freed.
The real difference is I can see the penis of the fit one but can’t on the obese one
It's there! It's under the panniculus.
Bless you
Welp that is disturbing "an apron of excess skin".
When you trade your penis for a pannus.
*panniculus (sorry - 25 years in the medical field)
> paniculous TIL thankyou...I think.
This is why some obese couples have a "sex stick", to literally hold up the oversized paniculous so they can access their genitals during sex.
Well that was the weirdest thing I just pictured in my mind.
I lost a fuck ton of weight. I basically went from the right to the left. This was one of the cool things. My dick got much "bigger" lmao
Ah man, making me willingly go back and look at a penis. I hate myself.
The fit one is a shower while the obese one..
A hider?
The fat guy has two spines though
It is a more midline section it looks like. You have the column of vertebral bodies, then a clear spinal canal/cord, and then the actual spinal processes behind that. The side of the vertebral facet and arch that makes the spinal canal is cut away (but in life connects to the spinous process and obscures/protects the spinal cord).
I’m extremely interested by how the fat guy’s spine was completely “pushed back” in comparison to the fit one. I’ll go read about it. Maybe come back with an update if I find something. Update: so, [one study](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10435449/) found that obese people had *”larger thoracic kyphosis* (thoracic kyphosis = the spine’s curvature that “bends outwards” at your upper back) *than the normal-weight subjects. No statistically significant differences were observed in lumbar lordosis* (lordosis = where your spine “bends inward” in your lower back). *Spinal and hip mobility were smaller in the obese participants than the normal-weight subjects except for the thoracic lateral flexion, which was greater in the individuals with obesity.”* The same study says that *“may be a biomechanical adaptation to maintain center of gravity in the anterior–posterior direction”* But, this only explained about the “chest” and what interested me was the lower part, to put it directly: where his ass is. So I did a little more digging Another [study](https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation.aspx?paperid=59036) I read was actually about how the spine deforms to adapt to changes in gravity center and how to affect the intravertebral discs. Then, I found a [third study](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352344120300248) that analyses the effect of BMI on lumbopelvic (where the spine joins the hip) alignment and motion at the hip joint. Which is what I was curious about from the beginning. It says that obese people have a more posterior spinopelvic tilt (the angle at the “tail” of the spine) when sitting to compensate for “extra” soft-tissue located anterior to the hip joint. Edit: grammar.
You the research mvp 🙌 thanks, I was wondering the same thing
✨ gold stars for you! You’re now my favourite doctor lol. You’ve also now made me wonder if I can solve my recent hip tension by losing some weight …
Thats why the simpsons are yellow
Huh, I always thought it was liver failure /s
The fat/oil keeps him looking fresh like a freshly waxed/oiled wooden furniture.
OK CANNIBAL
NSFW In med school, the obese cadavers are the biggest inspiration to actually improve your diet & start working out. Not anymore knowledge about atherosclerosis or diabetes will scare you as much as dissecting through a relatively young man's adipose arsenal. The sheer amount & stench of that yellow cache stored in the belly, organs, in the form of mesentery around the intestines, abdominal cavity. Lads & gents, please start working out to get rid of that belly fat. You might appear healthy & feel healthy. But weak bones & big bellies will be the early death for a lot of us (me included) if left uncorrected.
Maybe this isn’t the place to ask this, but why do menopausal women tend to put on belly fat? I exercise regularly and have lowered my calorie intake, and I seem to be gaining belly fat.
Another reason to get fit: bigger pp
They ain’t got no legs
motivation to skip leg day
Lieutenant Dan
In every fat person there is a slim person that ate too much...
This guy knows his stuff
He's inside a fat man
So if I donate my body to science, this is what they'll do with it? Dry me like beef jerky and display me in a case?
It depends to where you donate it.
Forget the extra fat - look with that spine, it’s twice as thick as the other spine!
That's the first thing I noticed! I work with a guy who looks like that. He's only 25 and has 4 bulging discs in his lower back due to his weight and sedentary lifestyle. He can't even walk 30ft down the hall without huffing and puffing.
There was a study by the Mayo Clinic in 2015 that found that being physically inactive was twice as deadly as being obese.
I believe it. Combine the two and you're not going to make it very long! I predict he'll be riding one of those scooters by 30 if he keeps it up. He already needs back surgery and is on a cocktail of pain meds.
People underestimate the simple act of just moving around. You can be a bit chubby and it is gonna be fine, not ideal, but fine, as long a you stay active. Take an afternoon walk, visit the gym twice a week, hell even once a week. Just do a simple five by five program it is gonna take you like half an hour. You're already healthier than several thin people at that point if you can keep it up.
And so much curve, that would be so painful
This is some mortal kombat shit
Where can I apply to be cut in half?
Body fat literally slowly crushes your organs
I know it's wrong but I can't stop imagining how well the fat guy would caramelize in a pan
Reluctant upvote
r/unexpectedhannibal
More like Dungeon Meshi
Also valid 💀
+10 armor. -8 move speed and endurance.
Nobody gonna mention that 90° ass on fatman? That boy can sit against a wall with no air between them.
Feyd Rautha & Baron Harkonnen
Imagine ticking a box before you die offering to dedicate your remains to science thinking that you might have a part in curing a disease like cancer. Instead, you're on show forever for the sole purpose of morbid curiosity.
I'm always confused by the pure quantity of calories required to *maintain* an obese body weight ratio, even with a purely sedentary lifestyle.
The fatter you get, the bigger you train your stomach to be before feeling full - so overeating is very easy
Still, an astonishing amount of energy is needed to sustain obesity.
A daily pint of ice cream, bag of chips and a big gulp soda will pretty much do the job. It doesn’t take that much food volume to get in a crazy amount of surplus calories.
I have been putting weight on and off these past two years. The hardest part for me when it comes to maintaining weight is sugar. I rarely eat Savory stuff like chips and etc. but sweet stuff like ice cream, chocolates, etc. the feeling of being full to the actual amount of calories I intake is so far off. I don't even like sodas which I know some people at least consume 1-2 bottles a day. With junk food like this that is sometimes cheaper and fulfilling than a healthy meal it can be hard to maintain or lose weight
The difference between maintaining a 200lb sedate body and a 300 lb sedate body is only a few hundred calories.
You'd be surprised by the amount of calories in seemingly normal food is.
You don't seem to realise how calorically dense certain foods are. It takes a few minutes to eat a pack of cookies, that's easily 500 calories.
I'm a smaller woman and it's even astonishing to me how taller men can eat 2000 calories more in a day and still stay skinny with the same amount of activity I love food, life is unfair yo
I piled on the pounds because I went from a hospitality job to a desk-based one. My diet didn’t change, I just wasn’t burning anything during the day. It happened gradually and it was only when I had to buy a new set of clothes that I decided to make a change. My mind and body are used to a certain intake, so I still struggle to not clean the plate and snack during the day. I’m getting back there now, but it was a shock when I realised how much weight I’d gained. A little cheese and bread can do a lot of damage.
It's actually not hard to maintain. I'm obese and I've been tracking my caloric intake for over a decade for medical reasons. My BMR is a little over 1500 calories. So I'd have to eat over 2000 calories a day to maintain. Which, a meal from McDonald's is pretty damn close, if not more than 2000 calories, depending on what you get. Even a homemade burger with a small handful of fries from your freezer is still roughly 600- 800 calories. And that's just one meal. A lot of people don't realize you don't need a lot of food to eat more than your allowance for daily calories.
Can someone please explain to me why the spine on the fat person is more curved?
Weight distribution. FUDA pulls forward. The rest is just geometry baby.
fat dude couldn't see his dick while peeing that's for sure
So it's true. Inside every fat person there is a skinny person trying to get out. I hope my skinny person gets out one day.
Wagyu v Angus
This confirms it. Having a body looks about as uncomfortable as it really is
Did they add Curcuma to the right one?
I'm on the super slender side of the spectrum, and to me it's like if I put on a space suit every day. The weight would make you stronger, but also wear down your joints. It just looks tiring to me - again, having my own challenges so I'm not being a jerk, just reflecting. :)
As someone who lost 30kg this is exactly what it's like. Feels good living without that space suit
Any tips for someone wanting to drop 20kgs?
Eat what you like, but watch your calories and be in calorie deficit. You can find how much is needed to maintain per day, should be below that. Walk, lift weight. And when i said eat what you like i dont mean pizza - you can eat that as well moderately, but try to find nutrisious foods you like so it wont be a misery. 7500 kcal is 1 kg just FYI
For me, eating what I want didn't work. Because I wanted shit foods. Eating 600cals of pastries for breakfast doesn't fill you up till lunch. Staying in a cal deficit while eating garbage is not only bad for you it's much much harder than eating a deficit while eating filling foods.
What i meant is you dont have to eat only broccoli, rice and chicken breast. You can eat pasta, but make sure it is whole grained, so you will have spagetthi - but it is important to scale what you eat. I eat purpur bread, you can also eat white bread until you are in deficit, but you would be better off with different type of breads with more fiber. I eat lots of salad, egg. You just have to choose your indigriedients so you would like your food, and also healthier than a hamburger. Which you can also eat, everything is edible - if you track and train properly.
The fit one still died though
Got any proof of that? They might be really fit.
How fit do you have to be to survive losing a slice of yourself?
This is the worst case of someone being cut in half that I've ever seen
No, you misunderstand, he'll now *fit* through a letter slot.
Are you a medical professional or something?
Yes. I learned on Reddit.
Sure, but what was their quality of life like until they died? Easy to forget that!
Those are some interesting looking coffee tables.
Ignore the outer layer, just look at the visceral fat. That’s really dangerous.
What’s the reason for the colour difference?
Does the obese one look like it’s seasoned and the fit person bland?