• Question: how long can you survive without 1) Sleep 2) Food 3) Water 4) Blinking

    Asked by yasrockangels to Mike, Pip, Tianfu, Tim, Tom on 28 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Tom Lister

      Tom Lister answered on 28 Jun 2012:

      1) I can manage about 3 days. The record is about 19 days
      2) Perhaps a couple of weeks if I was well prepared? Hunger strike people have lasted months.
      3) We can get a lot of what we need from foods, but I would imagine a couple of days without food or water would leave me pretty ill. I would guess at 5 days. Again, the record is probably much longer
      4) No idea how long before you eyes start to suffer damage, but I’m guessing a very long time.

    • Photo: Tim Stephens

      Tim Stephens answered on 28 Jun 2012:

      1) Three days? Wow – I’m pretty horrible to be around after more than about 36hours.
      2) If you have some water, quite a long time. There were some boys adrift in the Pacific on a small boat for 50 days a couple of years ago. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11836284
      3) If you don’t have water, not very long. Your body really really needs water.
      4) I think that blinking lubricates your eyes by moving your tears over them. There must be a reason why we blink so often, so my guess is that you’d be able to survive without blinking, but your eyes would be hurt quite quickly.

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