[maike11 (OP)]

What would happen if we just stopped sleeping? How many day would it take until we would die, and is that kind of similar for other mammals? I found this german article on short term impact of a lack of sleep. newbielink:https://www.schlafbook.de/schlafmangel/ [nonactive]  It is german article as I said so you would have to translate it with google translat or deepL or something. But the article talks about things like depression an being irritated when sleeping less. Would that be the same if we stopped sleeping at all? Or just at first and then other more serious stuff would happen quickly?

[charles1948]

What would happen if we just stopped sleeping? How many day would it take until we would die, and is that kind of similar for other mammals? I found this german article on short term impact of a lack of sleep. https://www.schlafbook.de/schlafmangel/  It is german article as I said so you would have to translate it with google translat or deepL or something. But the article talks about things like depression an being irritated when sleeping less. Would that be the same if we stopped sleeping at all? Or just at first and then other more serious stuff would happen quickly?

The usual explanation of sleeping is that it's a biological adaptation to the rotation of the Earth, which causes alternations between light and dark periods on our planet,

It we ever contact aliens who live on a planet that doesn't undergo such light/dark alternations, perhaps because their planet orbits a binary star, or multiple star-system where there's always at least one sun in their sky, so that there's no "Nightfall", it would be interesting to learn whether these aliens also have to "sleep".

Personally, as I get older, I increasingly resent "sleep".  It seems such a waste of precious time. It's just 6+ hours of  unconsciousness, punctuated by usually meaningless and sometimes distressing "dreams".  I don't like it at all.

Therefore I try to stay awake as long as possible.  The longest time was about 36 hours. But eventually, the desire to sleep couldn't be resisted any more. And I slept.  And afterwards, on waking up, I did feel refreshed.

So Maike, I think that sleep is necessary, just as much as food is. If deprived of food or sleep, we'd die. That seems to be the fact.

[evan_au]

Sleep is part of the daily chemical/biological cycle of every human cell - the circadian rhythm.
- It is an essential part of body maintenance, and when it is upset (eg by jet lag), we don't feel so good
- A daily activity cycle directly affects plants (because they need the sun for photosynthesis) and many animals also have a daily pattern of activity. A daily pattern has even been observed in the activity of jellyfish, which have no central nervous system.
- Chronic sleep deprivation leads to higher death rate
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_debt

But we mostly think of sleep as something that affects the brain
- Sleep (and dreaming) are thought to be part of the process of consolidating memories, and memory is less effective in sleep-deprived individuals


See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circadian_rhythm

[charles1948]

What you say, Evan, doesn't really affect the point I made - that "sleep" originated because the Earth undergoes
periodic alternations of light  -"Day," and dark - "Night"

If the Earth didn't experience these half-Day/ half-Night alternations, I can't see any biological reasons why living organisms should -  intrinsically -  have to keep shutting down half their time

[Zer0]

Hmmm...wat hapns wen v dont sleep eh???
🤔

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