5 ms·
It would be interesting to see whether the sweet taste is because of pure coincidence or whether it is because a small quantity of heavy water confers an evolut
by ampdepolymerase 5y ago
It would be interesting to see whether the sweet taste is because of pure coincidence or whether it is because a small quantity of heavy water confers an evolutionary advantage.
- amelius 5y agoI'd be curious at what concentration people can detect heavy water. My guess is that this concentration does not occur naturally, but I could be wrong.
- AlexandrB 5y agoI'm betting the latter. Consider that lead also tastes sweet[1], that's why kids would eat lead paint. Our ancestors were never placed in situations where eating either lead or heavy water could change evolutionary outcomes because these substances are not easily obtained in high concentrations in nature. [1] https://www.thoughtco.com/sugar-of-lead-3976065 https://www.thoughtco.com/sugar-of-lead-3976065
- teraflop 5y agoI assume you mean "former", not "latter"?
- rsynnott 5y agoIt's coincidence. Our ancestors didn't have access to heavy water.
- londons_explore 5y agoHeavy water exists naturally. It is reasonably common, and since it has a different density there might well be natural or biological processes which might concentrate it...
- Sharlin 5y agoAnother thing that tastes sweet is lead paint. That did not work out well.
- londons_explore 5y agoLead isn't good for the brain or nervous system, but does it have any benefits? Some poisons for example help disease resistance because the disease pathogens are harmed even more by the poison than we are.
- inglor_cz 5y agoWe do not know of any, either in humans or animals.
- quickthrower2 5y agoEvolution doesn’t need mutations that give perfection just an advantage on average. How much does lead paint occur in the environment humans traditionally evolved in?
- dekhn 5y agoNonetheless, there are proteins whose role is to bind and sequester lead, which means there was some functional selection to avoid lead toxicity.
- ksaj 5y agoAlso antifreeze, which dogs unfortunately find irresistible.
- Footkerchief 5y agoIndications are that it's generally bad for eukaryotes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heavy_water#Effect_on_biological_systems https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heavy_water#Effect_on_biologic...