What happens to a body when a person dies? Does it end up in a grave, cremated, or decomposing in a creepy neighbor’s backyard?
It may, but it could go on to be so much more. A body can go on to have, in a sense, a life after death. Bodies that are dedicated to science go on to have curious second lives as cadavers. They have new jobs and a new life where their efforts save and improve millions of lives.
How is this possible, one is may ask? Well, for one, cadavers do not have to do much more than lie around while they are manipulated by the living. They just lie there and regard researchers with nonjudgmental gazes while they are used in all sorts of manners to better understand the human body. Cadavers are used by medical doctors to perfect techniques, to better understand decomposition, and to better understand forensic applications, but these are the blander uses for cadavers. The cadavers that really get to experience a new life are those who are used as crash test dummies. It seems weird to use human bodies as crash test dummies, but through their enthusiastic devotion to be crashed into concrete walls, they save many lives.