Alien Nation (TV series)/Headscratchers: Difference between revisions

** I assume that salinity levels are what matters, just like humans can be exposed to heavily diluted acids without problems but are severely injured by highly concentrated acids. Sea water has much a higher salinity than human body fluids do, a much higher than the human body can stand, in fact, which is why drinking it can be fatal to humans.

*** <s> wow... I hate to break it to you, but [[You Fail Biology Forever]]. Human (and close to all other land creatures) have bodily fluids of THE SAME salinity as sea water (the technical term is isotonic). this is, in fact, one of the most often cited pieces of evidence that all life came from the sea. the reason you "can't" drink it is that because it's isotonic it doesn't lighten the body's salt-balance (the body typically losses more water then salt, so you need to drink things that are hybertonic) so drinking sea water doesn't hydrate you anymore then drinking nothing at all, so if you drink ONLY sea water you'll eventually dehydrate.</s>

***** The confusion likely comes from how body fluids may be about as salty as the seas were, ''when complex animal life first emerged in them''. A heck of a lot of minerals have been eroded into the oceans since then, forcing even native marine fish to expel the salt through various glands and excretory organs, these days.

*** Even so, kissing a human being should be at least as bad as slurping concentrated vinegar, which is 25% percent pure as opposed to regular 6% pure vinegar. Considering that salt water eats Newcomer skin like it was high-grade hydrochloric acid, even one third of that should be bad enough to cause extreme discomfort, especially in private places. Nevermind that most acids are actually pretty poisonous to humans even in low concentrations.