"I refuse to smell things because that's what dogs do and I'm too evolved to act like a dog" is the stupidest, face-palmingest thing I've read in a long time.

@ 1, Charles is full of dipshit ideas like that. Oh, to be a fly on the wall when he was being brought up.

Charles, without smell, there would be no taste. Chew on that for a while.

Charles, you taste with your nose.

All your tongue tells you is salt, sweet, sour, bitter, and umami. If you lost the receptors in your nose you wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a ripe strawberry and a piece of potato.

Stop trying to dehumanize yourself.

I love Charles. He has opinions. He has reasons. Sometimes they seem idiotic to me. Still, I love him.

Good Morning Charles,
Happy May Day or Law Day if one prefers.

Your posting piqued my curiosity. From time to time, I do smell the bouquet of a glass of wine before imbibing. Some bouquets are quite pleasant. But, I don't think my olfactory nerves are that good to discover exactly what kind it is. Still, I enjoy using my sense of smell. I find identifying drink or food before consuming fascinating. Curry is an example. At the markets in South Asia and Africa especially the aromas are most pleasurable.

You gave me an exercise. I shall try eating in the dark (blindfolded).

"Charles is full of dipshit ideas." Oh, Lord, there's an understatement.

why does he still have a job?

That's the best photo Charles has ever posted!

@2: Not true at all.

Anecdotaly, a friend lost her sense of smell a few years back with that Zicam cold remedy stuff so she loves rich and spicy foods to make up for it. At wine tastings she "fakes" smelling the bouquet.

@ 9, I doubt your friend truly "lost" her sense of smell. It might be a hell of a lot less than it used to be, but there's still something there if she can actually taste the flavors.

See @ 3 for a more detailed explanation.

Food is tasted with greater relish in the dark because you tend to have heightened senses from poking the fork into your cheek.

Smell. Smell. Smell! Sometimes I feel crippled by intense smells, mostly I feel swollen with the joy and pleasure of sniffing...Radiant with the echo of memories, images and overlapping connections.

The "olfactory information" I receive has so much meaning and depth. Poor Charles.

Aside from spawning the best meme of all time, Hell's Kitchen has also proven that most people cannot distinguish between foods in a blind taste test. Even wine experts have trouble telling the difference between white and red wine without visual cues.

@ 13, personally, I'd sooner believe that that proves that most "experts" are just talking out their ass, especially wine experts. Snobbery leads to desperate lying and exaggeration.

Thanks for that link. That was 24k gold.

Jesus man, half the pleasure of wine is how it smells. Is it possible your anti-smell position is subconsciously based on some misguided Marxist belief that wine appreciation is a game for the bourgeoisie? At least that would be ideologically consistent and not just batshit crazy.

@8 - Ha! Yes I thought the same thing: one of the crispest cell-phone-cam shots that he's posted! Did he get a new camera?

@13 - Try Top Chef, where the casting criteria seemingly go beyond "Emotionally fragile amateurs who will put up with a deflated basketball's verbal abuse." In their blind taste-test challenges, they tend to do much better.

@17,

I still think that proves my point. Sure, top-notch chefs can tell the difference, but regular people? Not so much.

@14,

I definitely agree that wine experts are largely full of shit, but in Wine for the Confused, John Cleese had a bunch of people do a taste test of wine, and they couldn't tell whether it was red or white.

I don't even necessarily think that's a bad thing; our enjoyment of food goes way beyond simple taste and smell. There's also its appearance, texture, fat and protein content, temperature. Unlike Charles, I'm not interested in discounting any of that because it's too "animalistic".

I suppose it depends on the red or the white wine used...but I can't imagine not being able to tell the difference.

I am imagining both right now and they sure seem different...

Um, Charles, we actually traded NIGHT VISION for color vision. (Well, we took points out of the former and put them into the latter.)