Students with a taste for the fascinating-but-macabre have just two more weeks to catch an exhibit of real human cadavers at the Franklin Institute Science Museum.
"Body Worlds: the Anatomical Exhibition of Real Human Bodies" includes 200 samples from actual human bodies. The bodies and individual body parts are preserved through a process called "plastination," which replaces human tissues with a synthetic substance.
Highlights include arrangements contrasting healthy and diseased organs as well as bodies posed as if they were playing sports to demonstrate muscle structures.
Currently, Philadelphia is the only city on the East Coast scheduled to host the traveling exhibit, so this may be students' only chance to see it before it leaves town after April 23.
No tours are given, but visitors should take an hour of two to view all the sections, according to the Franklin Institute Web site.
However, this is why the Body Worlds exhibit has been subject to some controversy.
"People are confused about the exhibit," Franklin Institute spokeswoman Lauren Rose said. "Controversy comes from where the bodies come from."
The bodies are obtained through a special donation program. Interested donors contact Body Worlds, which provides detailed information about the process. Donors then sign a "declaration of intent" in front of witnesses or a lawyer. If at any time they decide to decline from donating their bodies, they are able to do so.
For Body Worlds, "there is no need for questionable methods of obtaining bodies," Rose said.
Still, some have taken exception to the display of the bodies of children and fetuses, who could not have given consent on their own; it would have been obtained from their parents.
Artistic displays, such as one of a man carrying his own skin, have been criticized as making light of death.
The exhibit has recently extended its hours. The box office now opens at 7 a.m. Entry begins at 8 a.m. and ends at 10 p.m.
On its last weekend here, the museum will be open from 7 a.m. April 21 until 1 a.m. April 24.
Rose believes that this is "good for college student because they are more apt to come at crazy hours."
Body Worlds - The exhibit is at the Franklin Institute Science Museum at 222 N. 20th St. - Admission for students with identification costs $21.50 - The box office opens at 7 a.m. and entrances begin at 8 a.m. and end at 10 p.m.
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