Long gone are the days when, after a person’s death, he was thrown into a pit with other plague victims or thrown over walls to enemies. There are now many different options for your body, from aquamation (a process that leaves only the skeleton through water and alkaline hydrolysis) to the world of cryonics, where various freezing techniques exist.
Another option, apparently available since at least 1994, is to blow the ashes of cremated bodies into space. Space funeral company Celestis launches its customers’ ashes into space via other flights, freeing them to remain in orbit around the Earth, be sent into deep space, or rest on the surface of the Moon indefinitely. Nichelle Nichols, who played Lieutenant Uhura in Star Trek, series creator Gene Roddenberry and astronaut L. Gordon Cooper are among the names who preferred this space funeral ceremony.
A recent New York Times interview with people who choose to be “burial in space” outlined a variety of reasons why burial is involved, ranging from fear of the dark to love of the unknown.
Professor planning to send his DNA to the south pole of the Moon
A remarkable answer came from physics professor Kenneth Ohm, who plans to send his DNA to the south pole of the Moon. In addition to giving his family the opportunity to think about the Moon when they look at it, Ohm also sends his DNA there for “practical” purposes. He told the New York Times that this was partly for the possibility that advanced humans or alien civilizations might find his DNA 30 to 40,000 years in the future and use it for something exciting.
Ohm suggested that aliens could, for example, place a Ken Ohm in an intergalactic zoo or assemble an army of Ken clones to be distributed throughout the universe. It’s nice to see that a dream that’s probably not entirely serious is also among the reasons.
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