Any truth to this???

the myth that a person can spontaneously combust without a spark is false but under certain circumstances i guess there is a possibility

I first saw this myth on Unsolved Mysteries, thought it was the scariest thing I'd ever heard. I was still in high school at the time so I asked my chemistry teacher about it and he seemed to think there was some truth behind it.

This is the part I wished I had paid more attention too, he proceeded to mix 2 compounds together and they ignited violently, I think one may have been sugar, he said that mixing these 2 items was what made the phenomenon possible. I'm still a little skeptical.

Obviously, seeing Jamie and Adam do it would be way more fun.

No it is not possible. Biochemistry is pretty well known and there is nothing in the human body that will react like that. You seem to forget that all of those chemicals are in solution and are pretty dilute.

theTroll

"Spontaneous" human combustion is a well understood phenomenon and can be reproduced in a lab.

It occurs when a small fire ignites on comatose person. Usually, they're unconscious due to drugs, alcohol or poor health. A small fire starts in their clothes usually from cigarettes. The fire burns through the skin into the subcutaneous fat. A piece of clothing falls into the wound. The fat liquefies and wicks up the cloth just like liquified wax does in a candle. The fat burns producing a tall, slender flame. This liquefies more fat and the flame gets bigger and continues burning.

Eventually, you end up with a giant candle flame two to three feet high which consumes the body but not much else. It won't ignite anything it doesn't touch but it will scorch and melt things with its radiant heat. It's like holding a blow torch up in the middle of a room for an hour. Your get a lot of thermal effects as the heat slowly builds up but seldom ignition.

The flame burns until it runs out of body fat. Since even a normal weight person can have 20-30lb of fat mostly around their torso and hips, that a lot of fuel.

It's gruesome but not supernatural. It's just one of those weird things that fire does.

I think this is a myth that can be tested quite easily. There have been so many instances of similar occurences happening.

They could possibly test:

1) Cigarette Related Deaths
2) Static Clothing like Satin and the likes
3) Also alcohol and if it has any correlation

Along with a combination of these.

Come on lads! Try it out..

Originally posted by shannonlove:
"Since even a normal weight person can have 20-30lb of fat mostly around their torso and hips, that a lot of fuel."

Normal weight person with 20-30 lbs of fat? That's not normal, that's overweight.

Anyways, good argument and explanation. I agree with your theory. Even though I liked to think it is true, I still find it skeptical.

quote:

Normal weight person with 20-30 lbs of fat? That's not normal, that's overweight.

Do the math. Normal bodyfat is ~18% for men and 25% for women. A 180 lb man would be ~32 lbs of fat and a 140 lb woman would be 35 lbs of fat.

Again, that's normal bodyfat. These aren't the percentages for overweight people. Many men can see most of their abs when they get below 8-10%.

Most people would kill for only 20 pounds of bodyfat.

Unfortunately, the wick theory falls through when you consider that many victims were non-smokers with no external sources of flame available.

Then there's the charring of the bone to calcification, requiring temperatures in excess of 2500 degrees that not even crematoriums use. Nor is the localized fire damage so large as to create temperatures that high.

As I recall, jamie and adam tested the wick theory in one episode. They pronounced it busted despite having to burn down the entire room to reach temperatures high enough for body ignition, yet still nowhere near enough for bone calcification. /shrug

Then there are the survivors accounts. It's not always fatal. In every one of the accounts the flame is bluish, burns hot and cannot be put out- unexplainable witness corroboration for those seeking to prove it false.

Thomas, SHC is completely idiotic. There must be a cause for the ignition and that requires an external source. If you agree with the hypothesis, then how would you explain the ignition?

Thomas, SHC is completely idiotic.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Conjectural opinion. Irrelevant.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
There must be a cause for the ignition and that requires an external source.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Incorrect. Spontaneous combustion occurring in nature has no external source. That's why it's termed spontaneous.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
If you agree with the hypothesis, then how would you explain the ignition?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

I agree with the facts. Until someone can provide a more plausible explanation that fits those facts, I am quite comfortable with labeling the source of ignition as an unknown cause.

I am more curious as to why you are asking, since it is common knowledge that the cause is unknown. Are you really that unfamiliar with the subject at hand, or are you perchance attempting to draw some connection between my not knowing and the existence of the phenomenon itself? Ridiculous if so, as it is as irrelevant to the facts as yours.

People burn to death by the thousands every year. Forensic crime scene experts and insurance investigators generally have no difficulty identifying the causes and assigning blame. Why, then, would they have so much difficulty assigning cause in these cases to something you profess to be perfectly normal and aboveboard? They should see that sort of thing all the time, no flags should or would be raised. There would be no myth at all.

i think this is possible because the human body is capable of more than we understand and xcan comprehend.

I actually had a dream about this a few weeks ago where I was on Mythbusters and helped them test the myth of “spontaneous human combustion.” It’s taken a while to work out issues with my email, but here’s what my dream entailed:
First of all, in many pictures of spontaneous combustion (and easily the thing that intrigues me the most about it) is that the burnt areas that are human shaped. Of course what I’m basing this off of is late night unsolved mysteries that aired late night when I was a teenager, but follow me through on this….
http://whoyoucallingaskeptic.f...ing-bentley-1966.jpg
and the basement below where this supposedly took place
http://theshadowlands.net/spon4.jpg

I think that’s the most popular picture, but I even remember one with a bed and a remarkably clear almost cut-out human shape that burned through the mattress. Stay with me, for purposes of my dream let’s assume for the next few minutes that these actually happened and are real photos. In the dream Adam and Jamie and I researched the melting points for everything the body would have had to have burned through on it’s way down in the above picture such as pipes, wood, and any other support structures, even the drywall on the roof and the linoleum in the bathroom where this whole thing took place. Unfortunately I’m not too familiar with house construction so I’m probably leaving a few items. In my dream we also took in to account that some of these things would act as accelerants for the fire such as the wood and glue for the linoleum, including even a possible gas line and the polyester robe this guy was said to be wearing. I do remember specifically in my dream the first test had a pipe with water in it because in the top picture there are visible intact pipes and Jamie assumed water must have been running through them at the time, but we had to test again because it didn’t work. Anyways… and I’m sorry if I’m rambling… so melting point assumed, additional heat provided by the burning wood dry wall and linoleum, now the next step was to see how hot human body fat burned. Possibly because we learning how to determine Kcal in my chem. lab at the time, but we did a similar test in my dream burning fat under a container of water and monitoring the temperature change. Of course in the dream it wasn’t enough but close enough that Jamie convinced Adam that we should give it a try. Next step was that Adam constructed a room with everything a house would have in it, and the first thing they did was use animal fat, light it on fire, but ended up with little more then a scorch mark on the floor. The second time it was done with a whole dead pig, this had significantly more fire damage, but not in the defined shape we were trying to test. Last but not least in old myth busters fashion Adam got out the Napalm. In the dream it burned down the whole room, but of course it was fun to see, and the myth was Busted.

however, maybe there's things that I'm not thinking of and could be made bigger and better?

quote:

Originally posted by Thomas_Aquinas:
Thomas, SHC is completely idiotic.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Conjectural opinion. Irrelevant.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
There must be a cause for the ignition and that requires an external source.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Incorrect. Spontaneous combustion occurring in nature has no external source. That's why it's termed spontaneous.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
If you agree with the hypothesis, then how would you explain the ignition?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

I agree with the facts. Until someone can provide a more plausible explanation that fits those facts, I am quite comfortable with labeling the source of ignition as an unknown cause.

I am more curious as to why you are asking, since it is common knowledge that the cause is unknown. Are you really that unfamiliar with the subject at hand, or are you perchance attempting to draw some connection between my not knowing and the existence of the phenomenon itself? Ridiculous if so, as it is as irrelevant to the facts as yours.

People burn to death by the thousands every year. Forensic crime scene experts and insurance investigators generally have no difficulty identifying the causes and assigning blame. Why, then, would they have so much difficulty assigning cause in these cases to something you profess to be perfectly normal and aboveboard? They should see that sort of thing all the time, no flags should or would be raised. There would be no myth at all.

I believe the phrase oyu are looking for is "I reject your reality and substitute my own"

in every alleged case of SHC, fire investigators have found an external ignition source.

This should be tested!

Um, this is as opposed to PLANNED human combustion?

Aren't we getting off the deep end here?

This actually *is* being tested. It is the MythBusters longest running myth to date. Jamie and Adam are carefully watching the build team, and the build team is watching Jamie and Adam. So far, none of them has combusted spontaneously - although Adam did once lose an eyebrow to fire.......