How Long Does It Take To Die...

[The Condor]

You die in around thirty seconds in space. I think you either die exploding because of your blood boiling or no oxygen to breathe....

 

[farting bob]

you can die from lack of sleep- aventually.

No i dont think you can. After about 10 days your body forces you to sleep. without the use of special drugs you just go into something like a coma, but not as threatening.

Remember that big brother style program on a few years ago wehre people had to stay awake for 7 days in that special house and were given tasks, like survive a massage without falling asleep after 5 days awake. that was pretty good, but not much happened when they were tired, so the entertainment part of it was kind of lame. interesting though.

 

[Erik Mesoy]

I remember continually hearing the Rule of Three:
-3 minutes without air
-3 days without water
-3 weeks without food
(Those are for permanent damage, not death, so bump it to 4 for death, I guess.)

As for sleeplessness... a few months. But that requires someone else to keep you continually awake (preventing even microsleep), otherwise it's like trying to suffocate yourself: You can't.

 

[BCLG100]

Theres an article in FHM about suicide this month if your interested.

 

[Bozo Erectus]

If you strapped yourself to an atom bomb, youd die at the speed of light.

 

[farting bob]

If you strapped yourself to an atom bomb, youd die at the speed of light.

Not if you wear 2 pairs of jeans!

 

[Martacus]

No you wouldn't. An atomic bomb has to go off first before it can kill you at the speed of light. Or any conventional bomb for that matter. It would be silly to make weapons that can't be handled without instantaneously killing the handlers, wouldn't it?

 

[nonconformist]

I thought this thread was going to be about All Quiet on the Western Front.

 

[sanabas]

Theres an article in FHM about suicide this month if your interested.

I am. Linky?

As for sleeplessness, I don't think it's possible to kill yourself by staying awake. But insomnia/lack of sleep can certainly help contribute to death via exhaustion or similar. For one example, look at what happened to some mentally ill people before the advent of antipsychotics. Deaths did occur due to exhaustion, dehydration, etc, at least some of which was caused by not being able to sleep.

 

[Billy Rubin]

suffocation?
your brain starts taking damage, without oxygen after i think 3-4 minutes, you dies after 5-6 or so, its alittle diffrent from person to person, but forget hollywood movies where it takes 10 secondes to strangle someone.

Actually you could do it by crushing peoples larynx - the force needed to to that is also usually enough to compress the victims carotids strong enough to stop the brains blood circulation, so it usually takes abput 20 seconds for the person to pass out - with a crushed laryinx, the victim would then suffocate uncosciously.

To do it faster, you could still achieve a reflectory death by applying force to the carotid sinus nerve, which can result in reflectory death which would take less than ten seconds.

It's not suffocation, but you actually can strangle someone to death in less than ten seconds like in Hollywood movies.

 

[nonconformist]

From what I know, the fastest method of death is a bullet to the heart-makes the brain explode.

 

[WillJ]

Sleeplessnes: I heard somewhere that researchers killed a lab rat by keeping it awake for one week strait, but I don't know if this is true, or a construct of my deranged mind.

No, it's true; there was a Scientific American article about it. The researchers put the rats on rotating disks, and whenever the rats had any signs of falling asleep, the disks would spin the rats around a little while.

 

[El_Machinae]

From what I know, the fastest method of death is a bullet to the heart-makes the brain explode.

Wouldn't a bullet to the brain - making it explode, be even faster?

 

[nonconformist]

Wouldn't a bullet to the brain - making it explode, be even faster?

I'm not sure, but a bullet in the brain is far from being certain death.

 

[Billy Rubin]

Wouldn't a bullet to the brain - making it explode, be even faster?

Yup - especially with a mouth full of water and the barrel on your mouth - the shockwave will allmost be fully delivered to your cranium which will make it splatter around immediately - no brain=death.

Any other option achieving that is just as fast (helicopter blades, grenade in your mouth etc...).

But I guess the op wasn't asking for the quickest way...

 

[FriendlyFire]

3-3-3 Rules

3 minutes without air
3 days with water
3 weeks without food

(rught averages on survival probability. you chances of survival vary from person to person of course)

 

[chinesefireball]

You die in around thirty seconds in space. I think you either die exploding because of your blood boiling or no oxygen to breathe....

Its actually the excess of carbon dioxide in your blood that kills you - not the lack of oxygen

 

[The Condor]

Oh thanks for clearing that up chinesefireball*goes to google*.... However, despite whatever causes it it still is a sad, horrible death.

 

[Abaddon]

otherwise it's like trying to suffocate yourself: You can't.

Erm, quite easily actually. My friend did. All it takes is a plastic bag.

 

[The 777 Hoax]

Sleeplessness... isn't that called total insomnia or whatever?