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I have been told that one should never drink sea water no matter how much thirsty

It turns out that drinking saltwater adds lot of salts to the body that need much more water than the amount consumed to be removed leading to dehydration

A few questions arise in my mind

  • Why can't our kidneys excrete a little more concentrated urine than usual to remove excess salts (sea water is not saturated unless perhaps the Dead Sea water) At maximum a more concentrated urine will damage the bladder or some portions of the kidney but that will not kill us as fast as dehydration. Anyway the kidneys should know that the body is already having a shortage of water (that is why we are thirsty enough to drink salt).

  • Also should not absorption of salt stop in the intestine after enough has diffused passively And if it is being(in case concentration is high but not than of blood) being actively absorbed it should stop after desired amount has been absorbed

  • If it too concentrated and threatens to cause plasmolysis the intestines should actively absorb water right?

Chris
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Aurelius
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    Welcome to Biology.SE. The Biology.SE community has agreed that questions that show little or no prior research effort are off-topic on this site as are "homework" questions unless you have shown your attempt at an answer. Please [edit] your question and tell us where you've looked for answers, what you do know about the topic, and where exactly you still have questions. Under researched questions may be subject to down-voting and closure. Please take the [tour] and consult the [help] starting with [ask] for details. – tyersome Dec 05 '21 at 22:33
  • "Why can't our kidneys excrete a little more concentrated urine than usual to remove excess salts" Things have limits and sea water is beyond that limit. Just because I can run a bit faster than usual doesn't mean I can continuously speed up forever. "Also should not absorption of salt stop in the intestine after enough has diffused passively" Think about what you're saying here. When does diffusion stop? When concentrations are equal. Is that too salty for the body? Most definitely. I'm pretty sure you already know both those things but you do not seem to be adding 1 and 1 together. – DKNguyen Dec 05 '21 at 23:33
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    This has been asked and answered before. Search for "drinking sea water" in the search function at he upper left of the page; you will find some answers. – anongoodnurse Dec 06 '21 at 07:51
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    Please familiarize yourself with how this site works — your first two questions are already closed and now you are using the comments to try to start a discussion. A comment is ephemeral and intended for suggesting improvements to a post — do not use them to ask follow-up questions. ——— Note, from the [help/dont-ask], If your motivation for asking the question is “I would like to participate in a discussion about ______”, then you should not be asking here. – tyersome Dec 07 '21 at 22:11

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