Heres something a little weird

[HealyMonster]

I dont know, Im probably late to the party, but my wife said something to me the other day and imo it was like impossible, but I never really thought about it.

she said "we still dont know why we sleep". Im like um, because we are tired,wtf. and she said, no, we dont know why we get tired, like scientists still dont know what we need to sleep for.

so I ended up googling it and sure enough, the smartest people in the world cant figure out what we sleep for.

is that not strange to anyone else? Like we sleep for like half our lives yet we still dont know why? with all the technology and all that we know, this is a pretty big hurdle.

it just seemed so strange to me.

[lilloreo]

Re: Heres something a little weird

I was always under the impression that it was to let your body rest and recuperate. Your brain needs down time as well as the muscles in your body. Take your eyes for example, how many times have you read too much or just stayed up too long and they start to burn?

Granted I am not the brightest bulb on the tree but I never knew that it was up for debate?

[ODogg]

Re: Heres something a little weird

I read an article that said the reason scientists believe we sleep is that the brain uses that time to rebuild neuron connections in the brain. That makes sense to me, because if you don't sleep you become pretty crazy and hallucinate and stuff as the brain fails.

But overall the overall reason is probably as liloreo said, to recuperate. When we do activities our bodies break down and down time is used to rebuild them. I understand the question but here's how I see it, do you wonder why we can't run indefinitely down the road? Should we be able to? Something to think about.

[King10Sooted]

Re: Heres something a little weird

I think there are some things that are just going to remain unknown. There is some things that no matter what, we may never be able to find out the real answer. I think that this is one of those things.

Between being in the fire department, and playing poker a lot, I have one of the most ****ed up sleep schedules in the world probably lol. I kinda just catch a few hours when I have time, when ever that may be. I think it defiantly has something to do with letting the brain rest. After staying up for 50+ straight you really do start to become a little crazy. But the other weird thing is sometimes if you stay up a bit later, even when you are really tired, you will wake back up. I remember once after staying up for two days I was really tired. I was on my way home and I got a second wind, I went to lay down and couldnt actually sleep at all. I ended up staying up for another few hours. Sleep is defiantly one of the weirder things in regards to the human body.

[EnigmaNemesis]

Re: Heres something a little weird

They also can not figure out why we yawn, and why yawns are contagious.

I personally think we sleep to upload and download information to our "spiritual" selves. And also to rest and recoup. Since you get more tired the harder you work.

[King10Sooted]

Re: Heres something a little weird

They also can not figure out why we yawn, and why yawns are contagious.

I personally think we sleep to upload and download information to our "spiritual" selves. And also to rest and recoup. Since you get more tired the harder you work.

This post seriously made me yawn. Just talking about them is contagious I guess.

[ODogg]

Re: Heres something a little weird

Which makes me wonder if my brain is on the approved list of brains for ESPN3.com!!

[55]

Re: Heres something a little weird

we sleep for like half our lives

Speak for yourself. I sleep for approximately 25% of my life and feel I get enough rest.

[King10Sooted]

Re: Heres something a little weird

Speak for yourself. I sleep for approximately 25% of my life and feel I get enough rest.

Yea. I dont sleep very much either. Your body will get used to it after awhile, still probably isnt good for you though. I absolutely hate sleeping. There is so many things we can be up and awake doing. Why sleep?

[Kearnzo]

Re: Heres something a little weird

It doesn't even take me that long to get a little crazy. As of right now, i've been up for 26 hours, and i'm extremely hazy. Like everything takes a split second longer than usual to process, as if i'm lagging.

Damn overnight shifts. Friday's are lame. Stay up all day just to fall asleep Friday night and have a normal weekend. About halfway through the day all I want to do is sleep, but I know if I do, my weekend will be all messed up. Then when I actually lay down at like 8pm, it usually takes me a while to fall asleep.

[Gotmadskillzson]

Re: Heres something a little weird

I personally think we sleep to upload and download information to our "spiritual" selves

This reminds me of people who think sneezing is evil spirits trying to enter your body.

[mKoz26]

Re: Heres something a little weird

Which makes me wonder if my brain is on the approved list of brains for ESPN3.com!!

I go crazy if I stay up any more than 24 hours so that's my reason for sleep.

[HealyMonster]

Re: Heres something a little weird

Speak for yourself. I sleep for approximately 25% of my life and feel I get enough rest.

Dude, I wasnt stating scientific data. Ok so we sleep between 25-35% of our life. Do you feel better now? Theres always one....

[dossier]

Re: Heres something a little weird

there is some cracked article that stated if you could sleep in 20 minutes increments and still be able to maintain a healthy life style.

And it's not like your brain is actually relaxing, as it is when the brain is at it's most active state when it get's the most "rest"

I think it's something along the lines that sleep is actually intense focusing where we entertain the mind. I also think it has something to do with memory, such that we manage our memories, refresh old ones, etc.

Another crazy thought, we know more about space then we do about the deep oceans.

[CMH]

Re: Heres something a little weird

I don't think the effect is why scientists are confused. They know we get tired and need to recuperate.

What confuses scientists is why our bodies need to rest. Understand the entire question there. Why do our brains need to rest? Why do our bodies need to recuperate?

And what makes it more interesting to scientists is that sleeping puts us in our most susceptible position. We are defenseless when we sleep. Yet, despite the need (and think caveman back here) to survive in the wild living among wild animals before civilization became an after-thought, we never evolved to not need rest.

That's what I usually see brought up by scientist when they ask about sleep and the mystery behind why we need it.