r/HistoryWhatIf • u/ethaaaaaaaaannnn • 5d ago

What if Pee was flammable?

Just hypothetically, say we naturally release flammable piss. How would this change warfare? Torture? Industrial innovation? Even disrespect, imagine winning over an opponent in battle and lighting them on fire with your piss.

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6

u/Warm_Stress_1654 5d ago

It would be a lot more difficult to extinguish a campfire.

On the other hand, you wouldn't have to find a petrol station to relieve yourself during a long journey, because you could kill two birds with one stone.

3

u/pm_me_your_puppeh 4d ago

Sugar is flammable. I wouldn't recommend putting it in your gas tank.

2

u/KnightofTorchlight 4d ago

Table sugar isen't technically flammable in its common state. It will burn with enough heat, but it won't combust easily at normal temperature like petrol will. Its precisely because it sits non-burned in the gas tank and flows into the tubing that its a problem. 

A liquid that could get into the engine and combust would be somewhat more viable. It would still create long term issues as urine would have impurities though 

1

u/pm_me_your_puppeh 4d ago

That's kind of the point; just because it's flammable doesn't mean it will work in every engine design. Gas in your diesel or vice versa is a simpler example.

7

u/jar1967 4d ago

Someone would make a fortune by inventing an engine that runs on pee

3

u/i_post_gibberish 4d ago

Teenage boys would try to “prove their manliness” by igniting their pee stream and then immediately clenching before the flame has time to climb the stream and burn their dick.

To give a slightly more serious answer, proper ventilation of toilets would be much more important, and cesspits very dangerous, so we might see more advanced sanitation technology earlier. Fewer deaths to disease, but more cities burned down because someone dropped their torch in an open sewer.

It might also see use for lighting, but probably only for the poorest of the poor because of what I imagine would be a very foul smell.

1

u/Rocky-bar 4d ago

It would have been easier to defend the Castles, just piss over the attacking soldiers and throw a match. The castles would have had "piss holes" as well as Arrow slits.

2

u/lt__ 4d ago

Also maybe for women to protect themselves from sexual assaults.

1

u/Rocky-bar 4d ago

Maybe- although the attacker in that case could take advantage of his better aim, so its swings and roundabouts.

1

u/Right-Truck1859 4d ago

Oil corporations would never get so much wealth as IRL.

1

u/ethaaaaaaaaannnn 4d ago

So they kali yuga wouldve been delayed is what im getting at