Dying of eating salt, through dehydration and thereby death of your cells is due to osmosis; [SIZE=-1]the movement of water molecules from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration.[/SIZE]
Water will pass from within the cells, into the bloodstream, if there is more salt in the bloodstream, than in the cells. This works in reverse too, if there is too much salt in the cells / too little salt in the blood, water will pass into the cells. In extreme cases the effect is, in both cases, cell death. If the water leaves the cell, the cell will dehydrate and die. If the water passes into the cell it will, unless it is a plant cell, eventually explode, also killing the cell.
Plant cells will not explode since they, contrairy to animal cells, have a cell wall that makes the cell pretty damn resilent to physical pressure.
Therefore, eating too much / little salt can kill you, and so can drinking too much / little water. (Making the, oh so fantastic, "water diet" sort of dangerous, but everyone here knows that the only real way, and the only to loose weight is "enery input< energy spending" right?, the advanced equation is btw also the only factor in loosing weight, not weird tea leaves or secret russian chemicals, well there is ephedrine/caffeine combo drugs, but they just plain suck in so many ways I don't even know where to begin.) Ok back on track
Diffusion doesn't work between the blood stream and the cells, therefore negating diffusion of salt. This is due to the cell membrane being permeable only to water as far as I know. Salt can, anyways, only be actively transported through the membrane.
Well, therefore, salt can kill
1g a day probably isn't enough tho.
