Why Smell is the Dominant Sense - James

Why is the sense of smell the most dominant sense?

The sense of smell is extremely important to us because sometimes other senses such as sight and sound are limited. Cases like this could happen commonly at night. The most obvious reason people use dogs to track down drugs and explosives in airports is that dogs have a stronger sense of smell than humans. In war situations such as cases in the Second World War, the Germans couldn’t see where the Russians were but was able to track their general location through the smell of smoke.

Smell could also protect us from having to taste something before determining if it is poisonous or not. It could also let us detect the general content of anything we smell. If anything poisonous releases poisonous gas, it would be less damaging to smell than to taste it since there are more filters in our body to protect against what we inhale. Part of what we inhale is also breathed out, leaving less chance of the poison taking affect through smell. The state of gas is also the least compact compared to liquid and gas, therefore, least dangerous when inhaled.

It also helps us determine whether to eat something or not by telling us the general content of the food. Sometimes, for people who have allergies, it would also alert them to not take certain food due to detection of the content which they are allergic to.
Compared to other senses such as sight, the sense of smell covers everything around us while sight only covers 180°.