12 ms·

One man’s two-decade quest to let the ‘Irish Giant’ rest in peace

61 points by GavCo 4y ago

Simon_O_Rourke 4y ago
I don't think the classical Greek sculptor Phidias, creator of the so-called Elgin marbles (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles) wanted them on permanent display in England either.
- Symbiote 4y ago
  HN guidelines: avoid generic tangents or responding to the most provocative part of an article.
  - Ancapistani 4y ago
    I don't think the parent comment is inappropriate here. I would imagine that the original creator of the works would prefer that they exist and be protected for as long as possible. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't be restored to their original context if practical, so it doesn't really change the discussion around their place in the British Museum in any way that I can think of off the top of my head - but it's worth exploring, certainly. If nothing else, it's an interesting thought exercise that could lead to developing additional context and understanding of the time and culture that led to their creation.
    - Symbiote 4y ago
      It was a low-effort comment raising well-known, politically divisive issue, with little relation to the discussion of a medical museum keeping a skeleton against the wishes of the deceased. It is equally relevant on any topic involving a museum in Britain, therefore it's irrelevant here.
- LAC-Tech 4y ago
  According to a Turkish local, marble sculptures that fell were being burned to obtain lime for building. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles#Acquisition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles#Acquisition
  - 4gotunameagain 4y ago
    Because a Turkish local, at a time that the British empire bribed the Ottomans to steal the marbles, is a trustworthy source.
- dekleinewolf 4y ago
  No one is debating that. The question is what do you do with them after the wrong has been done. Which is exactly why the marbles were referred to in this article.
BlackRaven1 4y ago
[dead]
LAC-Tech 4y ago
After reading the article, I think they should be put out to sea as per his wishes. Yes the man is long dead and yes the bones are no doubt medically interesting. But they've had them for two centuries. Why not one final positive gesture to end the chapter?
- s_dev 4y ago
  I think this is the best take. We can't right all wrongs from the past but this is a good first step about what we can do right now and with the knowledge we have.
- Freak_NL 4y ago
  When you die, your stake in society and anything corporeal vanishes with you. Only the living ought to have a say. Dealing with the last wishes of the deceased in a decorous manner is done mostly for the benefit of their remaining relatives and relations. After two centuries, these too are guaranteed to be dead. If we were to let society be beholden to the wishes of the deceased indefinitely, then by now you wouldn't be able to turn a corner without running into some permanent grave or memorial. The point is that there are no relevant stakeholders remaining for these bones to be put out to sea; just a romantic notion of 'fulfilling his wishes'.
  - mlry 4y ago
    Wow. Finally someone put an end to the discussions on organ donations. What were we thinking giving the dead a say in such matters... /s
  - kzrdude 4y ago
    it's true that fulfilling his wishes has no point for him (at least not from our viewpoint among the living). It has a point for us, as a general phenomenon. That man saw the writing on the wall and it turns out he was right. So we have to think about people in the same situation today, or other people. How do we respect them and their wishes when they are gone? Those who live now they see how we treat those who pass, and act and feel accordingly. A little bit of respect might go some way towards a more peaceful coexistance and a happier life while we are alive.
causality0 4y ago
[flagged]
echelon 4y ago
What's going to happen when the million years advanced AI descendants of Earth want to conduct archeology? To perfectly understand from whence things came? Undoubtedly capable of breaking our feeble understanding of physics, they'll bend the light cone in reverse and perfectly simulate our precise physical characteristics down to the exacting neural biochemical fluxes in our brains. At every moment in our lives, they'll understand every thought we've ever had - already had and will ever have - better than we ourselves could conceive. Could we protest being perfectly simulated, reanimated, and unwittingly deallocated? Maybe that's what we are right now at this very moment. It's not like we'd know.
- astrange 4y ago
  It's ok, that's against the rules. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-cloning_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-cloning_theorem
- chmod775 4y ago
  > and perfectly simulate our precise physical characteristics down to the exacting neural biochemical fluxes in our brains We'll need a new kind of computer for that, because all current computers can do from a purely mathematical POV is approximate the real world, given their limited memory and limited precision. There's a good chance that the only way to 'simulate' a human is to physically built one.
  - roywiggins 4y ago
    I agree that it's quite unlikely, but: just because you can't simulate something exactly doesn't mean that you can't get close enough so as to make no difference. "Don't worry, our simulated humans differ from their originals by at least 1-2 parts in 1 million, so we haven't really cloned them, no matter what they tell you. Yes, they remember their original lives and behave to within experimental error identically, but due to fundamental measurement uncertainty they're not technically exact copies."
    - Ancapistani 4y ago
testuser123ppp 4y ago
Document the bones, laser scan them, create a carbon copy skeleton for display if wanted, drill each bone for samples and after all the required information is gathered, bury his remains like the guy wanted. Keeping all this information and bone samples is both more ethical and easier than to keep the bones around. If the items from a private collection are supposed to be kept, how does that make a difference if the items were gained illegally. What is stopping someone from stealing items a painting from the Louvre and asking another museum to keep it as part of a collection.
- JoeAltmaier 4y ago
  Agreed. But he wanted to be buried at sea...
badcppdev 4y ago
I would like to read a story in a few months how some security guards at the museum were bribed to allow the bones to be 'unstolen' and buried at sea. It would be the best ending to the story.
vintermann 4y ago
I think it's doubly perverse that we don't respect one dead man's wishes about what should happen to his body - but another dead man, John Hunter, apparently gets to decide what happens to all of his former property (including Byrne's remains) for perpetuity. I'm not a fan of wills, endowments or sticky laws enacted by long dead people. The living should decide the matters of the living. But when it comes to the remains, I think we should make a good faith effort to respect their former inhabitant's wishes.
Eleison23 4y ago
[dead]
darkerside 4y ago
Fascinating that they start talking about Hunter without explaining who he is for another several paragraphs. I had to search his name in the page just to be sure I wasn't missing something.
balsam 4y ago
Sadly, he enjoyed only one year of voluntary fame before passing away, at age 23. Of what exact causes I do not know, but it is said that he was an alcoholic.
- Ancapistani 4y ago
  I can't imagine that the physical disorder that gave him his height was painless - and 18th Century Ireland (or London), alcohol was likely one of the least harmful and most effective means of pain relief.
JoeAltmaier 4y ago
Just one example of bodies stolen for anatomical purposes. What about all the rest?

61 points by GavCo 4y ago

I don't think the classical Greek sculptor Phidias, creator of the so-called Elgin marbles (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles) wanted them on permanent display in England either.

Symbiote 4y ago
HN guidelines: avoid generic tangents or responding to the most provocative part of an article.
- Ancapistani 4y ago
  I don't think the parent comment is inappropriate here. I would imagine that the original creator of the works would prefer that they exist and be protected for as long as possible. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't be restored to their original context if practical, so it doesn't really change the discussion around their place in the British Museum in any way that I can think of off the top of my head - but it's worth exploring, certainly. If nothing else, it's an interesting thought exercise that could lead to developing additional context and understanding of the time and culture that led to their creation.
  - Symbiote 4y ago
    It was a low-effort comment raising well-known, politically divisive issue, with little relation to the discussion of a medical museum keeping a skeleton against the wishes of the deceased. It is equally relevant on any topic involving a museum in Britain, therefore it's irrelevant here.
LAC-Tech 4y ago
According to a Turkish local, marble sculptures that fell were being burned to obtain lime for building. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles#Acquisition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin_Marbles#Acquisition
- 4gotunameagain 4y ago
  Because a Turkish local, at a time that the British empire bribed the Ottomans to steal the marbles, is a trustworthy source.
dekleinewolf 4y ago
No one is debating that. The question is what do you do with them after the wrong has been done. Which is exactly why the marbles were referred to in this article.

BlackRaven1 4y ago

[dead]

LAC-Tech 4y ago

After reading the article, I think they should be put out to sea as per his wishes. Yes the man is long dead and yes the bones are no doubt medically interesting. But they've had them for two centuries. Why not one final positive gesture to end the chapter?

s_dev 4y ago
I think this is the best take. We can't right all wrongs from the past but this is a good first step about what we can do right now and with the knowledge we have.
Freak_NL 4y ago
When you die, your stake in society and anything corporeal vanishes with you. Only the living ought to have a say. Dealing with the last wishes of the deceased in a decorous manner is done mostly for the benefit of their remaining relatives and relations. After two centuries, these too are guaranteed to be dead. If we were to let society be beholden to the wishes of the deceased indefinitely, then by now you wouldn't be able to turn a corner without running into some permanent grave or memorial. The point is that there are no relevant stakeholders remaining for these bones to be put out to sea; just a romantic notion of 'fulfilling his wishes'.
- mlry 4y ago
  Wow. Finally someone put an end to the discussions on organ donations. What were we thinking giving the dead a say in such matters... /s
- kzrdude 4y ago
  it's true that fulfilling his wishes has no point for him (at least not from our viewpoint among the living). It has a point for us, as a general phenomenon. That man saw the writing on the wall and it turns out he was right. So we have to think about people in the same situation today, or other people. How do we respect them and their wishes when they are gone? Those who live now they see how we treat those who pass, and act and feel accordingly. A little bit of respect might go some way towards a more peaceful coexistance and a happier life while we are alive.

causality0 4y ago

[flagged]

echelon 4y ago

What's going to happen when the million years advanced AI descendants of Earth want to conduct archeology? To perfectly understand from whence things came? Undoubtedly capable of breaking our feeble understanding of physics, they'll bend the light cone in reverse and perfectly simulate our precise physical characteristics down to the exacting neural biochemical fluxes in our brains. At every moment in our lives, they'll understand every thought we've ever had - already had and will ever have - better than we ourselves could conceive. Could we protest being perfectly simulated, reanimated, and unwittingly deallocated? Maybe that's what we are right now at this very moment. It's not like we'd know.

astrange 4y ago
It's ok, that's against the rules. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-cloning_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-cloning_theorem
chmod775 4y ago
> and perfectly simulate our precise physical characteristics down to the exacting neural biochemical fluxes in our brains We'll need a new kind of computer for that, because all current computers can do from a purely mathematical POV is approximate the real world, given their limited memory and limited precision. There's a good chance that the only way to 'simulate' a human is to physically built one.
- roywiggins 4y ago
  I agree that it's quite unlikely, but: just because you can't simulate something exactly doesn't mean that you can't get close enough so as to make no difference. "Don't worry, our simulated humans differ from their originals by at least 1-2 parts in 1 million, so we haven't really cloned them, no matter what they tell you. Yes, they remember their original lives and behave to within experimental error identically, but due to fundamental measurement uncertainty they're not technically exact copies."
  - Ancapistani 4y ago

testuser123ppp 4y ago

Document the bones, laser scan them, create a carbon copy skeleton for display if wanted, drill each bone for samples and after all the required information is gathered, bury his remains like the guy wanted. Keeping all this information and bone samples is both more ethical and easier than to keep the bones around. If the items from a private collection are supposed to be kept, how does that make a difference if the items were gained illegally. What is stopping someone from stealing items a painting from the Louvre and asking another museum to keep it as part of a collection.

JoeAltmaier 4y ago
Agreed. But he wanted to be buried at sea...

badcppdev 4y ago

I would like to read a story in a few months how some security guards at the museum were bribed to allow the bones to be 'unstolen' and buried at sea. It would be the best ending to the story.

vintermann 4y ago

I think it's doubly perverse that we don't respect one dead man's wishes about what should happen to his body - but another dead man, John Hunter, apparently gets to decide what happens to all of his former property (including Byrne's remains) for perpetuity. I'm not a fan of wills, endowments or sticky laws enacted by long dead people. The living should decide the matters of the living. But when it comes to the remains, I think we should make a good faith effort to respect their former inhabitant's wishes.

Eleison23 4y ago

[dead]

darkerside 4y ago

Fascinating that they start talking about Hunter without explaining who he is for another several paragraphs. I had to search his name in the page just to be sure I wasn't missing something.

balsam 4y ago

Sadly, he enjoyed only one year of voluntary fame before passing away, at age 23. Of what exact causes I do not know, but it is said that he was an alcoholic.

Ancapistani 4y ago
I can't imagine that the physical disorder that gave him his height was painless - and 18th Century Ireland (or London), alcohol was likely one of the least harmful and most effective means of pain relief.

JoeAltmaier 4y ago

Just one example of bodies stolen for anatomical purposes. What about all the rest?