Could you help debunk Spontaneous Human Combustion,Both classic AND eye-witness cases

Discussion in 'Pseudoscience Archive' started by LanceLeblanc, Nov 18, 2011.

  1. Me-Ki-Gal Banned Banned

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  3. Dr Mabuse Percipient Thaumaturgist Registered Senior Member

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    The issue with the more credible 'spontaneous' cases is this: their bones and heart turn to ashes, this has been documented by police and medical examiners.

    In a crematorium it takes up to hours at extremely high heat levels(2000 f or above) to accomplish. The heat level would cause everything in the room to explode into flames, the air included, even the room/apartment/house itself would burst into flames, were it to be from an external source of heat. Yet there have been carefully documented cases where the person is ashes in a room untouched by fire. To have someone turned to ashes takes even higher heat levels than a crematoria, well over 2500 f.

    There is a good amount of evidence about this stuff going back a long ways.

    We don't know about this stuff. Yes rather thoughtless people clump it in with all manner of silliness like alien abduction and the like, but in fact this is one extraordinary phenomena which actually happens and does defy explanation.

    Some of the 'explanations' are more ridiculous than the idea of SHC itself.
     
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  5. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    The article noted that in at least one case the victim was euphemistically referred to in the newspaper account as "well-fed." It also described the mechanism by which a person's fat store could provide fuel for a continuous fire, "the wick effect."
    I'm not finding this in the Wikipedia summary. On the contrary, as the fat melts from the heat and wicks out, the other tissue remains more-or-less intact.
    It doesn't seem to defy explanation at all. The article is pretty straightforward.

    As for the "eyewitness accounts," apparently you haven't served on very many juries. Eyewitness testimony is horribly unreliable.
     
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  7. LeBlanc Banned Banned

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    If Spontaneous Human Combustion is a 'myth' then what about this case? From the news.

    A SECOND recent case of Spontaneous Human Combustion in Ireland..

    two recent cases in ireland, even the coroners and forensic experts and doctors, officials etc ruled them as SHC and was in the news (Irish Times). For example a 50-year old woman found burnt with only her leg, but nothing else. there was a lot of carbon monoxide in the air which killed her cats, and cyanide in her bloodstream. she was in the sitting room with a bottle of vodka next to her body. the smoke alarm went off and that is how they found her. (SHC events seem to happen during the cold, wonder if a persons body chemistry messes up?) SHC, where the body self-ignites through some process it posesses. Why? and the wick effect is just a myth/theory and has never been proven, either. As evidenced by eye-witness cases of people seen suddenly going up in flames, or skin smoking or mysterious blisters and burns. This is killing people too, so it should be mentioned, by law.

    So many things can/are said cause SHC, neurons misfiring or firing all at once, skin cells chemical elements becoming concentrated, or energizing, methane in stomach igniting due to enzymes, water splitting into flammable compounds, generating intense heat or nuclear fusion and magnetic fields in the body or particles or atoms/molecules and elements in the body speeding up (fission) and producing tremendous heat energy, igniting the body.
     
  8. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Do we really need two separate threads on this?
     
  9. LeBlanc Banned Banned

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    To clarify from the first one. You didn't answer my question or post, though. THis is a serious post and I would hence like to receive serious and relevant replies to it.
     
  10. LeBlanc Banned Banned

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    bump.
     
  11. Rhaedas Valued Senior Member

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    Actually experiments show the wick effect does work, and matches the evidence found in SHC cases. Also, from wiki:

    Almost all cases of SHC involve persons with low mobility, due to advanced age or obesity, along with poor health.[6] Victims show a high likelihood of dying in their sleep, or of being unable to move once they had caught fire.
    Cigarettes are often seen as the source of fire, as dropped cigarettes are the leading cause of house fires in the USA.[7] Natural causes such as heart attacks may lead to the victim dying, subsequently dropping the cigarette, which after a period of smouldering can ignite the victim's clothes.[8]

    Got some examples? I've never witnessed people doing this.

    These are more plausible than body fat wicking into clothing and acting as a candle does? :bugeye:
     
  12. LeBlanc Banned Banned

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    Still doesn't explain the case in ireland, nor does it explain where people are SEEN suddenly catching on FIRE.
     
  13. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    You really don't need to do that.
     
  14. Rhaedas Valued Senior Member

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    Like?
     
  15. LeBlanc Banned Banned

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    in the 1960s a 75 year old woman named olga was sleeping in a car, her driver recently got out the car then moments after witnesses saw an explosion of flames, she said it was too hot, nothing combustible was found in the car, she died 8 days later. a similar case a woman was driving and her hands errupted into yellow flames. she was ok though. Try to explain those.

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  16. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Try to explain a story without any accompanying evidence?
     
  17. Rhaedas Valued Senior Member

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    I can't with that kind of limited information.

    1960s? Reaching way back for something there...
     
  18. LeBlanc Banned Banned

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    Still, you failed to explain the case with the 50-year old woman in Ireland. :/
     
  19. Rhaedas Valued Senior Member

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    There's not a lot to go on from what I found. I did find another case in that news source: http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/1124/1224308051446.html

     
  20. Sock puppet path GRRRRRRRRRRRR Valued Senior Member

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    OK I am gonna spill the beans but then I will have to shoot you all, so read on at your peril.
    You know how when a normal particle and it's antimatter twin meet they release thier energy in the form of a bright but brief burst of energy? Well SHC happens when a person from here sits down in the same Lazy-boy as their antimatter twin. I know it shouldn't happen but it does on occasion.
     
  21. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    I seem to recall a demonstration of spontaneous combustion using a pig carcass that reproduced all of the essential elements associated with sponaneous combustion, including things like bones to ash, and everything above this height melted, everything below it unaffected, and so on.
     
  22. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    How dare you call "alien abductions" silly! You won't think it's so silly when they're probing _you._

    After all, how many cases of spontaneous human combustion have there been? 200? Compare that to the hundreds of alien abductions since 1960. And these poor people need medical assistance and counseling, not your ridicule and scorn!
     

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