The western scientific community has a pattern of not treating the bodies of the deceased with respect due, often for very questionable value. I used to be ok with this—one of my favorite museums is the Mütter museum—but as time goes on I grow increasingly uncomfortable with the display of human body parts or entire cadavers.
Perhaps we can excuse the use of bodies for collecting genetic samples and learning about the context in death. There are good reasons to even argue against that, but at the bare minimum we could preserve and store these outside the public eye in a modicum of respect for their gift to us.
Here in the US, our largest equivalent problems are the use of bodies of indigenous, enslaved, and convicted-as-criminals for merely museum display. This has no academic or scientific value; just the casual disrespect of the dead.
Even just here in Philadelphia, this problem isn't relegated to the Mütter museum. The Franklin institute regularly uses real bodies, not reproductions. It's not relegated to ancient history, either: the University of Pennsylvania managed to get their hands on the remains of victims of the 1985 police MOVE bombing. Why? How? To what end? Nobody can remember..... thankfully, the university has absolved itself as legally culpable.
> The western scientific community has a pattern of not treating the bodies of the deceased with respect due
Not just human bodies, but living animals as well, and until relatively recently living humans also. Western scientific culture has a utilitarian "ends-justify-the-means" problem, even when the ends are as dubious as testing a new kind of lipstick that is one cent cheaper to produce.
Perhaps we can excuse the use of bodies for collecting genetic samples and learning about the context in death. There are good reasons to even argue against that, but at the bare minimum we could preserve and store these outside the public eye in a modicum of respect for their gift to us.
Here in the US, our largest equivalent problems are the use of bodies of indigenous, enslaved, and convicted-as-criminals for merely museum display. This has no academic or scientific value; just the casual disrespect of the dead.
Even just here in Philadelphia, this problem isn't relegated to the Mütter museum. The Franklin institute regularly uses real bodies, not reproductions. It's not relegated to ancient history, either: the University of Pennsylvania managed to get their hands on the remains of victims of the 1985 police MOVE bombing. Why? How? To what end? Nobody can remember..... thankfully, the university has absolved itself as legally culpable.