Why do we have to contract our throat when swallowing water? I mean it could just slide right down to our tummies.
In: 205
Peristaltism is also used to push down food down into your stomach. though i’m not sure if the act of swallowing is part of that.
I imagine there were humans that had the ability to just let whatever is in the mouth slide down the throat without contracting. However, considering that food or water getting in the wrong way could provoke a reaction from the lung, they may have died off without passing on that trait.
There’s a part missing from the existing answers. Part of the muscle contractions in your throat when you swallow is guiding foods and liquids to your stomach in a process called peristalsis. Fun fact, it’s the reason that you can drink water while upside down
Are you actually 5 that you didn’t know this?
And what do people do when they shotgun a beer? It doesn’t seem like there’s any contraction going in there. Just open the gullet and let it wash down?
Somewhat related, and jumping off everyone else’s answers of “it’s so you don’t get liquids into your lungs”, there actually are people whose ability to swallow has degraded. Usually older people, though I’m sure it can happen to younger people as well. Anyway, depending on the severity, drinking regular water/drinks can be considered a hazard for them, since it’s suddenly so much more likely they might drown just from staying hydrated. Especially when the condition is comorbid with a mental decline, like dementia. People with weakened swallowing are encouraged to drink thickened water or juices, because it’s so much easier to swallow safely than regular liquids when you aren’t so good at swallowing anymore.
Source: worked in assisted living + memory care facility kitchens
Because evolution.
Our 4 legged ancestors reached their heads down and has to work against gravity. When evolved later to a monkey form, still squat down and bend over putting lips to water. For 100,000 years modern humans also squatted down leaned over and put lips to water – although sometimes they would scoop it up with one hand or two.
Drink from a drinking fountain and it’s still the same.
Drinking by having a container in hand and dump it down the gullet is pretty modern
Some people can actually just open their throats and guzzle water (or mostly I have seen it done with beer). I cannot, personally. I have a very strong compulsion to close my lungs whenever I swallow.
The throat is basically like a shared rail line with a track switch, and you are only supposed to be able to open the gut switch by closing the air switch. Some can bypass that, but lots of us cannot. The purpose is to prevent liquid from going to your lungs, obviously. It is an inbuilt safety feature.
I’ll chime in for all the plumbers from the bottom of this filthy hole I’m digging in someone’s foundation to say that our throat is basically a drain line to our stomach that doesn’t respect plumbing code, in that, it’s poorly attempting to stack-vent itself from the *same* opening as the drain which effectively means there no vent at all, or arguably, it’s attempting to wet-vent itself through the nose/sinus cavity which wrongly has a reduced diameter (capacity) when code would require, at minimum, one incremental increase in diameter to work effectively as a wet-vent.
It would fail an inspection with certainty.
Some people can relax it and let it go straight down. That’s how they can chug whole bottles instantly.
Latest Answers