posted
Well, there's something I could have done without...
Anyway, even if the thing at the beginning about blinking were true, it's possible he could have started blinking before decapitation, and continued afterwards w/o consciousness. Like the way a chicken's body continues to move after the head is removed.
------------------ "It'd be a pity if every pencil on Earth suddenly collapsed in on itself and blew everything up." -Krenim, TNO chat, September 30, 1999
posted
Deadcujo: Whoa, that just reminded me of those heads kept alive in jars from Futurama.
Kosh: "People usually pass out within five seconds of haveing their oxygen cut off, and I can't think of a better way to cut off oxygen!!!"
What do you mean? Certainly people can hold their breathes longer than that.
------------------ --Then, said Cranly, do you not intend to become a protestant? --I said that I had lost the faith, Stephen answered, but not that I had lost self-respect. What kind of liberation would that be to forsake an absurdity which is logical and coherent and to embrace one which is illogical and incoherent?
James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.
posted
I really doubt someone would try to hold their breath after getting their head chopped off. They'd be too frightened and stuff. For anyone who really wants to know more about severed heads, I really suggest that book
posted
When you hold your breath, your blood is still circulating. Oxygenated blood is still travelling to and from your (not empty) lungs, scavenging whatever oxygen is left from the air inside them. That's why CPR works, even though the breath you breathe into a victim comes from your lungs. There's still a lot oxygen left.
Your blood hasn't always given up all the oxygen in it by the time it returns to your heart for recirculation either, especially if you are lying still. I can see where the sudden cessation of circulation might cause more rapid loss of consciousness than simply holding one's breath.
Despite what you may imagine, the quick severing of the neck and spine caused by the guillotine blade is not the immediate, or even primary cause of death. The complete lack of freshly-oxygenated blood reaching the brain is what does the trick. A person would tend to lose consciousness very rapidly, though there would, of course, be considerable variation from one individual to the next.
The First One
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed
Member # 35
posted
Well, yes, but the sheer shock and trauma of the amputation would probably cause immediate loss of consciousness, thereby making the question moot.
------------------ Looking at cleavage is like looking at the sun. You don't stare at it. It's too risky. You get a sense of it and then you look away! - Jerry Seinfeld
posted
And it's a pretty neat cut too. In medieval times, I don't think the axe always landed on your neck..rather..higher? Nice thoughts for a friday afternoon. i'm twisted. Rowl!
Registered: Mar 1999
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