why can't you smell out of your mouth?

Question

i mean, your mouth and nose are connected, thats how you are able to breath through your nose. that said, why cant u smell throuth your mouth?

Answer 1

because the receptor cells in your mouth are not the right kind.

Answer 2

That's simply not where the glands are, they are in the nose. The nice thing about mouth & nose is that each set of gland, althought very different do work better together. Smell will give you an idea of what it might taste like and vice versa.

To answer more deeply, when you inhale from the mouth it doesn't pass by those special sets of gland which are very up in the nose, hence why people who have a congested nose generally can't smell anything. If I remember correctly, the glands that are responsible for the smell are locate almost between the eyes, so you can understand that when you inhale through your mouth, it doesn't go there! On the other side however, when you breath through your nose, if a smell is strong enough, you might taste it in the back of your mouth because the air going through your nose pass through the back of the throat where you still have tastebuds.

Answer 3

The human mouth and nose are only connected by virtue of the oral-nasal cavity, so you can breathe out of both. But your mouth and nose have very different purposes. The nose as smell receptors, and the mouth has taste buds. Though a sense of taste is almost entirely due to a sense of smell, the two are otherwise entirely different from one another in how they fuction. You might as well as why it is that you can't chew with your nose.

Answer 4

Actually, you can smell with your mouth ... our 'taste buds' are as much 'smell' as 'taste' oriented ... but in our brains, we 'associate' smell with our noses, and 'taste' with our mouths, so we 'separate' those 'taste/smell' things to 'fit' those associations. Try 'stuffing your nose with wet sponge, then 'tasting' things like garlic, sugar, salt, and alcohol. You should 'smell' the garlic and the alcohol, since those are more 'smell' oriented ... but you'll be able to taste' both the sugar and the salt with 'no smell' because those aren't 'odor associated.'

Answer 5

Because the olfactory sensory nerves (the smellers) are located in your nose not your mouth. And it's a good thing, too, because you'd hate to have to snort your breakfast!

Answer 6

the sense of smell was made for our noses as the sense of taste was made for our mouths only god knows the answer to your question

Answer 7

Because the olfactory system is located in the nasal cavity and not in the mouth.

Answer 8

there's no olfactory nerves inside your mouth and you breath in thru your nose. same way your nose can't taste anything

Answer 9

For the same reason you don't taste through your nose

Answer 10

Cats can, because they have an olfactory organ in their mouth called a "Jacobson's organ", which allows to to smell via their mouth. Human have no such organ, so we cannot.