151–160 of 325 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If you need oxygen, then you need sleep! Do plants sleep? Don't some insects, like flies, live without any sleep?
Plants breathe out oxygen, like we breathe out the other one.
Sleep is super important. I’ve seen too many workaholic types that barely sleep. So many of these folks end up with serious issues later in life.
One best things about getting laid off from work is that one get to sleep as long as one want in the morning!
So the ancient mystery of why we need sleep might have just been answered. The paper shows that cell‑autonomous mild uncoupling in Drosophila sleep‑inducing neurons -- via Ucp4A/Ucp4C -- keeps the flies awake by lowering mitochondrial Δp and therefore electron leak. This suggests a biochemical rationale for sleep -- which is postponed by the uncoupler. That form of pharmacological manipulation is also a very local in…
> So the ancient mystery of why we need sleep might have just been answered. I would be very surprised if sleep would serve only one purpose. In complex interconnected systems you usually don't get far with monocausal explanations.
Also if you lift in the mornings you feel lack of sleep/alcohol sleep disruption.
> If you need oxygen, then you need sleep! Would this also correlate with the desire to yawn? I always heard that yawning was a response to needing more oxygen.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think they meant "Modern" sleep. I think they meant "Only brief periods of highly energetic activity before returning to the usual activities were precursors to our modern consciousness/wakefulness"
That is also what I am referring to. Energetic activity is required to live and to reproduce, those are the normal activities. An active creature may have evolved a state of dormancy for various reasons, but there was never an organism in a state of pure dormancy.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think they meant "Modern" sleep. I think they meant "Only brief periods of highly energetic activity before returning to the usual activities were precursors to our modern consciousness/wakefulness"
That is also what I am referring to. Energetic activity is required to live and to reproduce, those are the normal activities. An active creature may have evolved a state of dormancy for various reasons, but there was never an organism in a state of pure dormancy.
There is a difference between being physically tired as a result of metabolic effort, and being mentally tired/sleepy. Even if you lie on the couch all day you will still be tired come night time, and can not survive for long if deprived of sleep. It seems the mental need for sleep comes from the brain needing offline (no sensory input) downtime for "housekeeping" activities - perhaps essentially organizing and filin…
the brain burns more power when doing mentally exhausting tasks than at idle, so it makes sense to have to recharge mitochondria in there. (the 'more' is not huge, like 5% - so it also makes sense to be tired after a lazy day I guess)
We fundamentally sleep at night based on circadian rhythm (evolved from earth's 24hr day), not based on activity level. We do also feel tired after a strenuous activity, but recover after a little rest and nutrition - this doesn't appear to be the same thing as the fundamental need for sleep.
> If you need oxygen, then you need sleep! Would this also correlate with the desire to yawn? I always heard that yawning was a response to needing more oxygen.
It has nothing to do with oxygen; Yawning is caused by other people yawning in the vicinity.
Could this be an explanation for why people who go without sleep for long enough eventually just die? The Guinness Book of World Records doesn't accept records on staying awake for the same reason they don't accept records for the longest game of Russian Roulette.